Many congratulations to my student Bunny Liu for winning first prize at an international piano competition in Los Angeles a few days ago, playing Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody 12!
Showing posts with label piano competitions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label piano competitions. Show all posts
Thursday, 6 August 2015
Saturday, 3 May 2014
Congratulations to my (former) students!
Congratulations to my former students Emmy and Mike Huang on their recent successes in Southampton (UK)!
Emmy Huang came 1st place in the Chappell Challenge and
also won a medal in the Baroque or Classical Junior Piano, 14 years and
under class, Mike Huang won the Southampton Piano Teachers’
Challenge Cup, and the Whitwam Trophy, awarded to him for being the most
promising junior pianist.
Monday, 4 November 2013
Piano Competitions and the Wizard of Oz
I don't know if you have watched the classic movie the Wizard of Oz? When Dorothy finally arrives at Emerald City and peeps behind the curtain, she realises that the mighty Oz was an illusion. Smoke and mirrors. I have been wondering the same about piano competitions recently. So much huff and puff, and... are the rewards actually worth it for the performer? I decided to conduct an objective experiment to evaluate - are the winners of piano competitions actually getting the solo recitals that their efforts deserve? Here is how I conducted my experiment.
1) I checked out the results of the two most famous competitions: Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow, and the Leeds Piano Competition, UK. A full table of winners is here: Leeds competition winners. I decided to randomly select 5 prize winners from the past and check how many recitals they have advertised on their websites in the coming 6 months.
2) Using the wikipedia table, I assigned a number to each prize-winner as follows: top line, Federico C. is number 1 [1-6 reading L to R]; 2nd line, Sofya G. is number 7, [7-12 reading L to R]etc.
3) Then I visited a 'random number generator website, 'random number generator website, and selected five numbers between 1 and 42. (In my case it gave me 15, 1, 9, 41, 38). So this gave me the names of five Leeds prize-winners between 1993 and 2012.
4) Then I looked online for the websites of these performers, or their agents, and found their concert schedule / concert diary / upcoming engagements etc.
5) Grand total. The number of solo recitals in the next 18 months for the five prize-winning pianists, all added together into one big total, was ... drumroll... 25. So an average of five 5 recitals per prize-winner over the next 6 months. Some of these recitals were in pretty small venues such as the tiny Scottish town of Nairn (8,401 population). [Nairn Community and Arts Centre (15 November 2013), Holy Trinity Church, Nairn, 16 November etc, for Alessandro T., performer number 9].
Now I am absolutely sure that these competition winners play better than me, and that the concert-going public of small towns are great listeners, I have no doubt about it. But the question remains: does the evidence suggest that competition winners are genuinely launched into productive careers on the solo platform, or not?
If you want to check other competition results, I challenge you to find out how many upcoming recitals you can find by Ayako Uehara, 1st prize winner of the Tchaikovsky piano competition.
Is their effort worth it? Perhaps not. You probably know how hard it is to win a major international piano competition, right? Think becoming a brain surgeon, winning Miss World / Mr Universe, and learning to write Arabic.
The point is, perhaps the concert-going public is no longer buying the whole piano competition thing. Consciously or unconsciously, have we reached a tipping-point where people realise that a gladiatorial system is not best suited to expressive artistry? Perhaps the public is over-saturated with pianists performing very similar repertoire (Gaspard de la Nuit, Liszt Sonata, etc), so that it may have become a disadvantage to be a competition winner.
What the public IS buying is pianists who have NOT won competitions. Paris and Tokyo and New York are buying Yuja Wang, Arkadi Volodos, Yvgeny Kissin, Marc-Andre Hamelin, Daniel Barenboim, Valentina Lisitsa, etc etc
But, I hear you cry, what about great performers who have won competitions? Like Radu Lupu and Daniil Trifonov. Well, I suspect that, like Yuja Wang and Volodos, they would have come to the attention of concert agents, the public, and record companies, with or without competitions.
I admit any counting method is open to debate: pianists may have failed to update their website; or you need to search in the home language of the performer (eg in Japanese for a Japanese winner). Having said that, if you look up Yuja Wang's upcoming schedule, it is pretty clear, even if you don't search in Chinese script.
But I am not asking you to accept my figures - be brave, take a peek behind the curtain of the Wizard of Oz, see what is (or is not) behind the curtain!
2) Using the wikipedia table, I assigned a number to each prize-winner as follows: top line, Federico C. is number 1 [1-6 reading L to R]; 2nd line, Sofya G. is number 7, [7-12 reading L to R]etc.
3) Then I visited a 'random number generator website, 'random number generator website, and selected five numbers between 1 and 42. (In my case it gave me 15, 1, 9, 41, 38). So this gave me the names of five Leeds prize-winners between 1993 and 2012.
4) Then I looked online for the websites of these performers, or their agents, and found their concert schedule / concert diary / upcoming engagements etc.
5) Grand total. The number of solo recitals in the next 18 months for the five prize-winning pianists, all added together into one big total, was ... drumroll... 25. So an average of five 5 recitals per prize-winner over the next 6 months. Some of these recitals were in pretty small venues such as the tiny Scottish town of Nairn (8,401 population). [Nairn Community and Arts Centre (15 November 2013), Holy Trinity Church, Nairn, 16 November etc, for Alessandro T., performer number 9].
Now I am absolutely sure that these competition winners play better than me, and that the concert-going public of small towns are great listeners, I have no doubt about it. But the question remains: does the evidence suggest that competition winners are genuinely launched into productive careers on the solo platform, or not?
If you want to check other competition results, I challenge you to find out how many upcoming recitals you can find by Ayako Uehara, 1st prize winner of the Tchaikovsky piano competition.
Is their effort worth it? Perhaps not. You probably know how hard it is to win a major international piano competition, right? Think becoming a brain surgeon, winning Miss World / Mr Universe, and learning to write Arabic.
The point is, perhaps the concert-going public is no longer buying the whole piano competition thing. Consciously or unconsciously, have we reached a tipping-point where people realise that a gladiatorial system is not best suited to expressive artistry? Perhaps the public is over-saturated with pianists performing very similar repertoire (Gaspard de la Nuit, Liszt Sonata, etc), so that it may have become a disadvantage to be a competition winner.
What the public IS buying is pianists who have NOT won competitions. Paris and Tokyo and New York are buying Yuja Wang, Arkadi Volodos, Yvgeny Kissin, Marc-Andre Hamelin, Daniel Barenboim, Valentina Lisitsa, etc etc
 | ||
| 1st prize winner, Vienna Piano Competition, playing Gaspard de la Nuit with his left hand alone |
I admit any counting method is open to debate: pianists may have failed to update their website; or you need to search in the home language of the performer (eg in Japanese for a Japanese winner). Having said that, if you look up Yuja Wang's upcoming schedule, it is pretty clear, even if you don't search in Chinese script.
But I am not asking you to accept my figures - be brave, take a peek behind the curtain of the Wizard of Oz, see what is (or is not) behind the curtain!
Wednesday, 6 February 2013
congratulations!
Congratulations to my pupil Abhinav Tiwari for winning First place in the Rotary Young Musicians Competition in Winchester this week. Chopin Fantaisie-Impromptu is a tricky piece!
Through to the next round. Keep up the good work!
Through to the next round. Keep up the good work!
Monday, 7 September 2009
Manifesto
From the heart, to the heart' as Beethoven said. And classical piano playing had real life and emotional communicative power in the 1920's, 30s and 40s. Since then, pianists appear to have become judge and jury in their own demise, and for many listeners, rather than being a life changing experience of higher revelation, piano music has become reduced to the sort of anodyne background music you hear in the hotel lift. Let us first diagnose this downfall, and then point to some positives.
Four elements conspired to alter public taste: recordings, competitions, modern instruments, and larger halls.
Aided by the increasing interest in higher fidelity commercial recordings, a different aesthetic of piano performance was gradually forming in the 1950s, 60s and onwards, which now favoured a clean sound, rather antiseptic, free of smudges, free of irrational individuality. For repeated listening at home, many people would rather have an LP which was straightforward, rather than an LP which was revelatory and demanding to listen to! So producers of record companies wielded more and more power, and projects became defined by convenience - 'there's a gap in the market for complete Satie, which pianist can be relied on to learn quickly, play cleanly and not have tantrums in the studio?And he/she must look good on the front cover'. Rather than preserving the voice of a lone genius. Pianists, with a monkey sitting on their shoulder, that fearful knowledge that audiences are able to compare recordings carefully at home on CD ("O, he's slower than Michelangeli at bar 54"), seem to have cultivated a zone of self preservation, an unwillingness to take risks, including that greatest of human risks: expressing deep-felt emotions. Late 20th century pianists - the cultivation of artificial pearls.
International jurors are also responsible for shaping the product that emerges before the public. Contestants have been rewarded for playing conservatively, since a straightforward interpretation which is accurate, loud, fast and crowd pleasing is more likely to gain the winning vote in the gladiatorial colisseum. Do the maths: if the choice is between two pianists, with seven jurors, the pianist who plays straight may be marked 7 out of ten by all jurors, total 49; whereas one who plays in a 'visionary / mad / genius' style may be marked say 10 out of 10 by two jurors who are sympathetic, and 5 out of 10 by the others who don't believe the public will accept him/her, total 45. In brief, individual artistry is out, and accurate sportsmanship is in. This process has shaped (or maimed) the taste of a generation of concert goers (not to mention the damage done to the ears, hearts and fingers of aspiring pianists who have played Liszt's Sonata one billion times in a quest for technical perfection).
While record companies and competition juries have shaped a less colourful product, the piano manufacturers and concert hall managers have too played their part. Instruments have become heavier, halls bigger; with so many seats to fill, the managers again are more likely to play safe in favour of artists who will hit all the right notes night after night.
This background has a consequence on the technical production of piano music. In matters of tone quality, older pianists (such as Anton Rubinstein) favoured a fuller sound through 'free fall' technique, whereby the weight of gravity is used in falling on the keys with grandeur; this technique, however, came at the risk of hitting adjacent wrong notes (since the hands were falling from a dangerous height - hard to control). The modern pianist, being risk averse, prefers to play the keys from closer distance, thus ensuring accuracy, at the cost of tone or timbre. The modern audience, listening at home on a CD, appreciates the clean sound, and gradually the appreciation of the aesthetic and emotional advantages of the older, richer sound, has been lost. The depth of raw emotional communication has been sacrificed for a pre-packaged cleanliness.
So it seems, gone are the longer, resonating sounds and the grandeur of emotion of a bygone era. For an echo of a distant era try listening to Ervin Nyiregyhazi's account of Liszt's Legend no. 2, or, to view this pianist's technique in action, try Blanchet's In the Old Turkish Harem Garden' on youtube. Warning: pianistic adult content!!
Will an appreciation of the older aesthetic ever return? Or is this a futile wish, like harking back to the days of the horse and cart? Should we return to candle-lit soirees in intimate venues, an age of patronage? Instruments which are slightly lighter and capable of Chopinesque poetry as well as Lisztian strength? Is the world ready for a reinterpretation of the piano recital?
This blog and my web site, matthewkoumis/com, will be posting detailed appreciation of such masters of the golden age of pianism as Josef Hofmann, Yves Nat, Sofronitszky, Alfred Cortot, Josef Lhevinne, Ignaz Friedman, Dinu Lipatti, Annie Fischer etc referring to specific technical elements as described by pianists in their memoirs, and as visible in recordings and videos on youtube. My posts will include recommended reading and listening, and recommended repertoire for those pianists wanting a kind of 'Great Pianists Boot Camp', in the comfort of your own home! Points will include: hand position, position of the thumb, pedalling, phrasing, repertoire, concert suggestions, and useful links. It is hoped this will stimulate discussion and inform my older and younger colleagues in the international community of pianists, and enable a reawakening of appreciation of genuine pianism, as it was so to speak in the days 'before the flood'!
With best wishes to fellow enthusiastic pianophiles, and also to those who may yet be converted! 'From the heart to the heart'.
Four elements conspired to alter public taste: recordings, competitions, modern instruments, and larger halls.
Aided by the increasing interest in higher fidelity commercial recordings, a different aesthetic of piano performance was gradually forming in the 1950s, 60s and onwards, which now favoured a clean sound, rather antiseptic, free of smudges, free of irrational individuality. For repeated listening at home, many people would rather have an LP which was straightforward, rather than an LP which was revelatory and demanding to listen to! So producers of record companies wielded more and more power, and projects became defined by convenience - 'there's a gap in the market for complete Satie, which pianist can be relied on to learn quickly, play cleanly and not have tantrums in the studio?And he/she must look good on the front cover'. Rather than preserving the voice of a lone genius. Pianists, with a monkey sitting on their shoulder, that fearful knowledge that audiences are able to compare recordings carefully at home on CD ("O, he's slower than Michelangeli at bar 54"), seem to have cultivated a zone of self preservation, an unwillingness to take risks, including that greatest of human risks: expressing deep-felt emotions. Late 20th century pianists - the cultivation of artificial pearls.
International jurors are also responsible for shaping the product that emerges before the public. Contestants have been rewarded for playing conservatively, since a straightforward interpretation which is accurate, loud, fast and crowd pleasing is more likely to gain the winning vote in the gladiatorial colisseum. Do the maths: if the choice is between two pianists, with seven jurors, the pianist who plays straight may be marked 7 out of ten by all jurors, total 49; whereas one who plays in a 'visionary / mad / genius' style may be marked say 10 out of 10 by two jurors who are sympathetic, and 5 out of 10 by the others who don't believe the public will accept him/her, total 45. In brief, individual artistry is out, and accurate sportsmanship is in. This process has shaped (or maimed) the taste of a generation of concert goers (not to mention the damage done to the ears, hearts and fingers of aspiring pianists who have played Liszt's Sonata one billion times in a quest for technical perfection).
While record companies and competition juries have shaped a less colourful product, the piano manufacturers and concert hall managers have too played their part. Instruments have become heavier, halls bigger; with so many seats to fill, the managers again are more likely to play safe in favour of artists who will hit all the right notes night after night.
This background has a consequence on the technical production of piano music. In matters of tone quality, older pianists (such as Anton Rubinstein) favoured a fuller sound through 'free fall' technique, whereby the weight of gravity is used in falling on the keys with grandeur; this technique, however, came at the risk of hitting adjacent wrong notes (since the hands were falling from a dangerous height - hard to control). The modern pianist, being risk averse, prefers to play the keys from closer distance, thus ensuring accuracy, at the cost of tone or timbre. The modern audience, listening at home on a CD, appreciates the clean sound, and gradually the appreciation of the aesthetic and emotional advantages of the older, richer sound, has been lost. The depth of raw emotional communication has been sacrificed for a pre-packaged cleanliness.
So it seems, gone are the longer, resonating sounds and the grandeur of emotion of a bygone era. For an echo of a distant era try listening to Ervin Nyiregyhazi's account of Liszt's Legend no. 2, or, to view this pianist's technique in action, try Blanchet's In the Old Turkish Harem Garden' on youtube. Warning: pianistic adult content!!
Will an appreciation of the older aesthetic ever return? Or is this a futile wish, like harking back to the days of the horse and cart? Should we return to candle-lit soirees in intimate venues, an age of patronage? Instruments which are slightly lighter and capable of Chopinesque poetry as well as Lisztian strength? Is the world ready for a reinterpretation of the piano recital?
This blog and my web site, matthewkoumis/com, will be posting detailed appreciation of such masters of the golden age of pianism as Josef Hofmann, Yves Nat, Sofronitszky, Alfred Cortot, Josef Lhevinne, Ignaz Friedman, Dinu Lipatti, Annie Fischer etc referring to specific technical elements as described by pianists in their memoirs, and as visible in recordings and videos on youtube. My posts will include recommended reading and listening, and recommended repertoire for those pianists wanting a kind of 'Great Pianists Boot Camp', in the comfort of your own home! Points will include: hand position, position of the thumb, pedalling, phrasing, repertoire, concert suggestions, and useful links. It is hoped this will stimulate discussion and inform my older and younger colleagues in the international community of pianists, and enable a reawakening of appreciation of genuine pianism, as it was so to speak in the days 'before the flood'!
With best wishes to fellow enthusiastic pianophiles, and also to those who may yet be converted! 'From the heart to the heart'.
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