Cleveland piano competition - End of Round I

Friday night’s performances concluded round I. I didn’t listen to all performances but it seems that the young contestants are in a hurry to get somewhere; especially Lu Chen (25, China) who almost made me jump off the chair with his Beethoven sonata No.23. A bit too aggressive with very sharp mood changes, almost frightening, in my view. 

Round II will start today, Saturday 1pm EDT. All 26 contestants will play another recital, a bit longer than 25 minutes. The order of performances is the same as in round I. 

You can find the schedule on this link:

Performances schedule 

For the program, check the contestants information on: 

Links to contestants info 

Note: I find the quality of the live webcast much better than the archive on YouTube. It makes it very hard get a good impression of the music listening to the archive. If you want quality, I suggest making the time to watch and listen to the performances live.

Enjoy!

Cleveland Piano Competition 2011 – Links and Info

The Cleveland piano competition started yesterday with the first 8 contestants playing their 30 Minutes recital in round I. Unfortunately I could not follow it online but am catching up right now on the competition's YouTube channel

Links with information, chats and webcast:

Cleveland piano competition Official website 

Daily performances schedule download 

Watch live webcast 

Contestants list and info 

Additional resources and chats 

Competition's YouTube Channel (Incl. all performances) 

Facebook page of Cleveland piano competition 

Come back soon to read more, listen and Enjoy!

The blog - (short story 12)

So what is this blog about? Reading some posts and scrolling around you probably have no clue. No "about me" nor photo, (using my writer's name), mixed posts of short stories, photos, flowers, beaches, foundation, quotes and then 2 weeks of Tchaikovsky competition.

I started this blog for fun, to have a place where I can write whatever I feel like and at the same time learn new toys and play.

When I started this blog the only visitors that got on it where close friends and some coincidental viewers that got to it from Blogger itself or as a result of irrelevant search. 2-5 page views a day. While I was following the Tchaikovsky piano competition in Moscow, I wrote a post about it for my friends that enjoy listening sometimes to classical music but don’t really know what to listen to. A great way to centralise info, links and recommendations.

As I was following the competition very closely, listening to all performances, watching the complete webcasts including the interesting interviews and commentaries, reading updates on the official website, I kept writing posts with relevant subjects I found interesting and some of my own opinions and views. After a week of writing I noticed a nice increase in the number of visitors to my blog, increase in time spent on the blog, increase in traffic sources, from 99% direct traffic and 1% search engines to 35% direct traffic, referring sites and search engines. The pick was on the last day of the finals (piano). The performance ended around 5pm and the awards ceremony was to start at 8pm but the actual start time was around 9:30pm. The tension was felt over the web and through everyone taking part or following the competition. As people were waiting to hear the results, I noticed the drastic increase in viewers, realising people are searching for the information and so I responded with update posts every 30 min on the progress.

Now you know what the 2 weeks of posts on XIV Tchaikovsky competition is doing here in between all the rest.

But what about me? This I leave for a future post.

What about the music? I will write more, as promised, so come back again soon to check the updates.

Enjoy!

Should I stay or should I go? - Part II

…. this is exactly why I go out in the sun & stay in with the rain….my rule never lets me down!!

July 13th, NL

And it doesn't look like its going to stop any time soon... 

Should I stay or should I go?

Every work place has its own rules and regulations, some rules are more important and written somewhere in the organization's policies and some are not exactly official and are not written anywhere but are commonly known and followed by most. A good example of an unofficial rule in a society that values high quality of life but unfortunately is located in a region with mostly shit weather all year round is, when it is nice weather, drop everything, go outside and enjoy while you can.

Good rules are easy to adopt, especially if they make so much sense. I personally don’t like too many rules but the above example is definitely one I am very strict on keeping. So how can I allow myself to go out and have fun when there’s so much work to do?

Remember many years ago, we used to use only paper and pen? Yes, before we all had personal computers and way before the internet became part of our daily lives. So school bag is ready, packed with a notebook (the original notebook, filled with papers), pen, pencil, sunscreen, sarong, hat, sunglasses, cooler bag with drinks & snacks and I’m all ready for another beautiful day at the park / lake / beach / forest, to be outside, get active and inspired, think, plan, schedule and document. 

And if I want to include a bit of workout before and after the hard day at work I’ll ride my bicycle and not the car. I love the summer!

Colours of nature

The Netherlands, land of flowers…

After a nice day at the park, bright colours and cool shapes of nature uploaded to my notebook and over the web…

International Piano Competitions

For the classical music fans and especially piano fans that are interested in international competitions, the following link has all competitions, festivals and events including dates and further links to the different websites:

http://masamizuno.com/pianonew2.html 

Checking the “Piano Calendar” from the menu on the left, you can see there are many competitions all around the world almost all year round. I don’t know if all the competitions have or will have an online webcast to view the performances but I will keep posting updates on the relevant competition when covered.

The next competition I will post updates on will be:

Cleveland International Piano Competition July 27^th – August 7^th, 2011.

http://clevelandpiano.org/ 

Liszt International Piano Competition September 8^th – 19^th, 2011.

http://www.filharmoniabp.hu/en/international_piano_competition_memoriam_ferenc_liszt 

More information will be posted later this month.

Enjoy!

Relaxing time

And what a beautiful day to relax on and in the water after 2 thrilling weeks being attached to the internet...

 

For the music fans, next post will provide information on the next piano competitions.

ParaClassics.com archive

The archive works again and I found all of the piano finals when selecting by competition dates but there are 2 mistakes. The piano performances from 29^th June are under the category of the 28^th. These are Seong Jin Cho playing the Tchaikovsky concerto and Alexander Romanovsky playing the Rachmaninoff concerto. Here’s the link to archive:

http://pitch.paraclassics.com/#/archive 

Listen to Daniil Trifonov and ParaClassics.com

I don’t know what is going on with the archive section on ParaClassics webcast; it’s unavailable for a while. It might being updated now but the last time I checked it Daniil Trifonov and Yeol Eum Son’s concertos performances with the orchestra were removed. The recitals were still available but if you want to listen to Daniil plays Chopin concerto No.1 for piano and orchestra and many others, here’s links:

XIII Arthur Rubinstein competition - Daniil Trifonov 

Daniil Trifonov official website 

Enjoy!

XIV Tchaikovsky competition is over

Daniil Trifonov receiving the great Tchaikovsky statuette, Congratulations!

Daniil Trifonov Grand-Prix winner XIV Tchaikovsky comp. 2011

The competition is over. It was a marvellous 2 weeks, listening to top musicians, and the fact that I could follow it all online and listen to all performances live made it all such a great success for us, the online audience.

For the winners it is just the beginning. As part of the competition’s regulations, the winners will tour for 3 years around the world as the winners of the XIV Tchaikovsky competition. Information about the performances, schedule etc. can be found on the official Tchaikovsky competition website:

http://www.tchaikovsky-competition.com/en/the_tchaikovsky/winners_tours

I know I will follow the schedule and will be very interested to listen to Daniil Trifonov and to Yeol Eum Son live on stage, or any of the other piano competitors from round II. I am very curious in which countries they will perform and maybe it will be the next excuse for me to go traveling. Nothing better than combining traveling with good music, it goes very well together, at least for me.

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - Grand-Prix - results

Nice performances tonight, each and one of them. It was great to listen to the winners from all disciplines in one evening. Truly, all fine artists. Bravo!

And the winner of the grand-prix goes to….

Daniil Trifonov.

Daniil received a statuette of the great Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and even though the announcement didn’t come as a surprise to anyone it was an excitement moment in general and I’m sure for him, maybe the best of his life.

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - gala concert - grand-prix

Yeol Eum Son keeps amazes me each time I listen to her. She played so well tonight a part of Prokofiev concerto for piano and orchestra (didn’t understand which No. as it was said in Russian only) incredible!

The grand-prix winner will be announced at the end of the concert, of course… keep us all in suspense….

Enjoy!

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - Gala concert - Moscow

I just finished watching tonight’s gala concert in Moscow, (not live for the first time) and all I can think of is WOW WOW WOW !!!

So Daniil Trifonov didn’t play all what I hoped for but he did surprise me with La Campanella by Liszt that he also played as an encore at the XIII Arthur Rubinstein competition last month. He started his performance playing the 2^nd & 3^rd parts from the Tchaikovsky piano concerto No.1 that we heard 5 times in the finals and after that the beautiful mentioned piece. All played beautifully according to the standards Daniil got me used to… Ye, this young pianist is deep in it now and he has expectations to fulfil. He made himself a big name and he will just have to make it.

It’s definitely worth watching, an outstanding performance, either live on Saturday 20:00 Moscow time or any other time through this archive: Daniil's performance at the end of the concert.

http://pitch.paraclassics.com/#/live/gala-moscow 

Enjoy!

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - grand-prix winner

Update: Saturday's gala concert and grand-prix award in St. Petersburg will starts at 20:00 Moscow time and not at 19:00 as mentioned earlier.

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - Daniil Trifonov Winner

So you think it is over, ha? Well, not just yet. 

Daniil Trifonov 1st prize winner!

Yeol Eum Son 2nd prize

Yes, we have the discipline winners but we still don't have the Grand-Prix winner. What is the Grand-Prix? One grand winner to be chosen from all disciplines which will be awarded on the gala concert tomorrow night in St. Petersburg, starts at 19:00 Moscow time, and will be broadcasted on the usual webcast. There is also a gala concert of the winners tonight in Moscow but no awards tonight. I don’t know the program of the concerts as it was not published but if it will be available I will post it. The gala concert tonight starts at 19:00 Moscow time and should be broadcasted as well on the usual webcast. I hope to hear Daniil Trifonov plays Chopin and Tchaikovsky concertos again, but I think this is too much to hope for…

It was a very entertaining couple of hours yesterday waiting for the awards ceremony to start. I was ready online with the broadcast a few minutes before the planned starting time (8pm Moscow) but due to the late arrival of the St. Petersburg jury and participants, the final start time of the event was over 1 hour and a half later. While waiting, I got on the facebook page of the competition and there everything was happening…. 

For about an hour and a half people were chewing nails, making comments and jokes that clearly show signs of nervousness and anticipation. Bets on the winners followed by discussion and arguments, people not able to find the webcast, worried that they’re missing it, begging for someone to post the link again or tell them what they can see to check if they see the same. Tips to use FireFox and not IE, refresh the page, choose “live piano” from menu, re-start your PC, all the good old known tips.

One thing useful I learned from all these pre-announcements discussions, and it was also wrote under the same though (probably):  “as we are currently waiting anyway, does anyone know when and where is the next international piano competition?” and thanks to some knowledgeable followers I now can prepare myself for September when the International Liszt piano competition will take place in Budapest :)


Enjoy!