XIV Tchaikovsky competition - words from two jury members

Peter Donohoe, pianist & jury member.

One of the jury members, pianist Peter Donohoe, winner of 1982 Tchaikovsky competition was interviewed last night after the performances. He started the interview all emotional and excited saying Tchaikovsky No.1 always makes him cry as he slowly stabilizes his emotions and speech. It was interesting to hear some of the rules / guidance of the jury, how the committee tries to maintain a high level of art, as Mr Donohoe said: "we are looking for perfect pianists". He explained; it is not that they're looking at how the pianists master or control the piano. It is beyond that. At this level they are all assumed to be masters. It is each character and he's emotions transferred from the composer to the audience. And if they do make a mistake, if it does slips, as it does sometimes to the best as well (or at least so they say. I do believe that perfect IS perfect and can be achieved just not by anyone) then that is not what is going to get them out of the round. What is more important is the sound in each and every scenario. It has to touch the listener and carry him with, it has to be perfect!

Mr Donohoe was asked if they are to judge each round separately on its own or as a combination of all rounds. The bottom line is: each round on its performance. Plain and clear. But, and there’s always a “but” in these circumstances, how can you separate what you heard in the recital rounds or the chamber concerto, how can you ignore those moments you cried (or almost cried) from listening to a particular competitor? And that is what makes the jury’s task so difficult, and sometimes their decisions are not unanimous.

Mr Donohoe also talked about the ones who leave the competition. It does not mean that the ones who didn’t make it to later stages of the competition are not good pianists. On the contrary, as said above, at this level of competition, leaving in the middle of the 2^nd round means you are pretty damn good but just not matured yet to win this competition, come again if you can in 4 or 8 years.

Yefim Bronfman, pianist & jury member (final)

A world known pianist has joined the jury today for the final round. Yefim Bronfman, a master pianist that never participated in any competition.  He admits, he got famous quite young and didn’t need to take this path. Mr Bronfman was talking with the hosts at the beginning of the evening saying that he feels a bit guilty coming over completely fresh without hearing the previous rounds, as if he missed the whole dinner and showed up only for the dessert. Yefim Bronfman is the only jury member that does not hold any competition prize. On the question if the other jury members “filled him in” on the pianists and the previous rounds he replied “I got a very thick book of rules which says that you’re not allowed to discuss anything”.

Today and tomorrow the performances will starts at 1pm Moscow time. Two competitors will play today: Alexander Romanovsky (Ukraine) and Seong Jin Cho (South Korea). Tomorrow we will hear the last three competitors.

Enjoy!

XIV Tchaikovsky competition - Round III - piano

Daniil Trifonov 24.06.11, Moscow. Downloaded from competition's website

The order of the performances of round III was just published this morning on the competition's website. In contrast to previous rounds where the pianists were playing their full repertoire in one performance, in the 3rd round the performances are split so that each competitor will play one concerto per performance. The performances are scheduled for the following 4 days, Monday till Thursday. Monday and Tuesday the 5 finalists will play 1 concerto. We will hear Tchaikovsky 3 times and Rachmaninoff concerto twice. Wednesday and Thursday the 5 will play their 2nd concerto which will include twice the Tchaikovsky concerto, Rachmaninoff, Brahms and Chopin once. The organizers mixed the order between the Tchaikovsky concerto and the free choice concerto so that we won't have to listen 3 times to Tchaikovsky in one night, or maybe they split it for another reason, but that's good enough for me.... :)

Link:
Round III schedule - Competition website

Last but not least, in previous post I added a link to Daniil Trifonov's blog where you can listen to him playing at the Chopin competition, music by Chopin.

This link is to Daniil's website media archive where you can listen to more pieces played by Daniil incl. Scarlati, Mozart (piano concerto No.23 played in both Rubinstein and Tchaikovsky competitions), Liszt, Prokofiev, Scriabin and of course, Chopin:

Daniil Trifonov video's

Enjoy!

Piano

Inspired by the recent XIII Arthur Rubinstein Master Piano competition in IL and the current Tchaikovsky competition held in Moscow (14th-30th June, 2011).


There were 29 pianists staring the competition in the first round. 12 continued to the 2nd round. Last night, after 2 days listening to 12 master pianists who played every piece from their impressive and beautiful repertoire so precise, emotional and absolutely delightful to the ears, I was lost. I didn't know how the jury could pick only 8 to continue to the 2nd part of the 2nd round. It was obvious that the jury felt the same as it took them about an hour and 45 minutes to make their decision. Not so sure if I completely agree with their choice, but it was definitely not an easy one to make and as always in art, each individual has a different taste.

Today the pianists are practicing with the chamber orchestra their Mozart concerto to be played in the next part of round 2 (Thursday and Friday) and I have a day off. I guess the ears needs a bit of a rest after the last week to be able to continue listening with full enjoyment.

At the end of the 2nd round on Friday night the jury will have to make another cut and choose 5 finalists out of the 8. Saturday and Sunday the 5 finalists will practice their 2 virtuosic concertos with the orchestra which will be played during the following 4 days, Monday-Thursday.
Each of the competitors is required to play in the 3rd round 2 concertos, either the concerto no.1 or no.2 by Tchaikovsky and another concerto of their choice. Well, it seems that all the 8 competitors that are now in round 2 all chose the 1st concerto by Tchaikovsky which means not only that it will be heard 5 times in the final but that this is a great opportunity to compare between the pianists and their interpretation of this magnificent concerto.
Now to the 2nd concerto of their choice. There can never be a piano competition without Rachmaninoff in the final round. No wonder the No. 3 is my favorite, not only mine it seems. Just as an example, out of the 29th pianists starting this competition, 9 chose the 3rd concerto by Rachmaninoff!! As it stands now, out of the current 8 pianists, the 3rd concerto will be played 4 times, but it can still change.

Last note, if you enjoy classical music I highly recommend getting on the competition Webcast (link below) to view the following concerts. All info including schedule, repertoire, regulations etc. can be found on the website.

Tchaikovsky XIV Competition Webcast


Enjoy!