18th International Chopin Competition
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Was scrolling through the list of contestants. It looks like over 80% of them are Asians of the far-eastern/Oriental varieties. It seems competitive classical piano playing has become a de facto racist enterprise.
@klaus said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
Everyone of them would have made headlines and been given the biggest concert halls 150 years ago.
Due to widespread racial discrimination 150 years ago, most of the Asian pianists would have been barred from entering the US, let alone be given concert halls, due to the various versions of the Chinese Exclusion Act in effect in that era.
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Listening to Miki Yamagata now, technically impassive for sure, and I liked her Nocturnes and Mazurkas, keep hoping for stronger left-hand melodic elements in her Etudes, and keep hoping for more swagger, more robust rubato with her Ballade #4. My prediction is that she will advance past the preliminaries but probably will not advance as far as YuChong Wu whom I heard yesterday.
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@klaus said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
The level in this competition is insanely high. I'd gladly attend a full concert of basically every contestant I heard so far. Everyone of them would have made headlines and been given the biggest concert halls 150 years ago.
So piano playing is a solved problem, you say?
Education is extremely important.
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@horace said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
So piano playing is a solved problem, you say?
It’s only a problem when Klaus is playing. The solution is well known - get him to stop.
DON’T let them eat cake.
- RFK Jr -
@jon-nyc said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
@horace said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
So piano playing is a solved problem, you say?
It’s only a problem when Klaus is playing. The solution is well known - get him to stop.
But getting me to stop isn't easy. Only if you pry the piano from my dead cold hands.
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@klaus said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
One thing this competition reminds me of: I don't really like most of the Mazurkas. Does anyone? I like almost everything else from Chopin, but the Mazurkas don't work for me.
The Mazurkas are where Chopin went full Polish, they are more "ethnic music" than "classical music", so I supposed from that standpoint it does not surprise me that the Mazurkas do not appeal to the non-Poles the same way the other Chopin pieces do.
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From today's competitors....here's Boao Zhang (18 years old!) playing what most pianists consider to be the hardest etude, Op. 10 No. 2. Knocks it off with ease.
Link to video
I think he's a candidate to advance to the finals. -
I would never have guessed he's only 18, I mean if I walked by him on the street.
I haven't studied the etudes enough to have a strong ranking viewpoint, but agree that 10/2 is a bear.
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@sd-tav said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
Boao Zhang (18 years old!) playing […] etude, Op. 10 No. 2. Knocks it off with ease.
Went listen because you called out him out. Agree with you assessment that he knocked Op.10 #2 out of the park; that performance was divine.
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The list of competitors who advanced to Stage 1 has been posted.
The preliminary round eliminated half of the competitors. A little over 2/3 of competitors from China advanced. Just a bit less than half of Japan’s competitors advanced. Amazingly, 15 out of 16 competitors from Poland advanced!
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@axtremus Of course the Polish competitors advanced. They could understand the application!
I'm looking forward to watching the finals in October. A piano friend told me she hopes to be able to attend the competition in Warsaw. I said, "you do realize that the competitors mostly play Chopin?" She slammed the piano lid on my fingers!
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The 12 finalists have been announced. They will compete this week to determine the winner. Should be interesting! There are really fine players in this group.
Chopin competition web site -
@axtremus said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
@klaus said in 18th International Chopin Competition:
One thing this competition reminds me of: I don't really like most of the Mazurkas. Does anyone? I like almost everything else from Chopin, but the Mazurkas don't work for me.
The Mazurkas are where Chopin went full Polish, they are more "ethnic music" than "classical music", so I supposed from that standpoint it does not surprise me that the Mazurkas do not appeal to the non-Poles the same way the other Chopin pieces do.
What little I listened to, skipping around, was impressive technically and expressively.
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