G.P.

It has been a busy concerto summer here in Cleveland, for our orchestra had to play the final rounds of two international competitions on top of accompanying our own guest artists. It was exciting to hear the competitors both in rehearsal and performance, and also to see the difference between up-and-coming young artists and seasoned performers with the same orchestra.

The first competition was the Cleveland International Piano Competition, and it lasted for 10 days, culminating in the performance of four finalists with The Cleveland Orchestra. I was very happy to hear four very different players in the finals, especially as the common criticism is that these days all the players sound the same.

The winner was Alexander Schimpf from Germany, and his finals piece was Beethoven's 4th piano concerto. He seemed an intelligent and energetic performer! Second prize went to Russia, to Aleksey Chernov who played Brahms' first piano concerto. From the first moment in the rehearsal it seemed that he is very familiar with the orchestra part and can perform with confidence. He seemed a bit nervous in the performance though, and it was interesting to see how the fourth prize winner Kyu Yeon Kim (South Korea) played the same concerto. She seemed to be not as much at ease with the orchestra, but during her cadenzas she played with much more freedom than Chernov! Third prize went to Eric Zuber (USA) who played a strong though a little hectic account of the Rachmaninov 2nd concerto.

Just a week after the piano competition we had the pleasure to work with Yuja Wang who despite being only in her twenties is an experienced performer with a huge repertoire and a busy schedule. Between her and the four competitors I heard there was no competition, really! She set herself apart already by her confidence and calmness since the very first rehearsal. Small things make a real professional!

Yuja played Prokofiev's third piano concerto with us in Blossom, and she was very well received by our enthusiastic festival audience. For me it was just wonderful to watch how her hands were flying over the keyboard with apparent ease, while knowing how devilishly difficult the piece is. My fellow blogger Lincoln wrote a very nice piece about the concert - check it out here!

Our second competition was the Cooper International Competition which alternates between violin and piano every year. It is intended to very young performers as the upper age limit is 18. The competition is organized by the Oberlin Conservatory and all the finalists are guaranteed a free ride if they decide to study in Obelin for their undergraduate studies.

We heard three very young and very talented violinists play three very different pieces - Prokofiev's second concerto, the Mendelssohn violin concerto and the Sibelius violin concerto. When the players are this young it is hard to tell whether the interpretation comes from them or from their teacher, but what surprised me was how out of style the Mendelssohn sounded to me, with aggressive tone and all the cliché rubatos you could possibly put there. Even more it surprised me that the jury thought the interpretation worth the top prize! I guess I shouldn't be surprised having gone through a dozen conducting competitions, but still I found it strange that some people - professional musicians - could hear the music so differently from me. Probably that means that I should keep Mendelssohn out of my concert programs no matter how much I love him...

As a final word about violinists, two weeks ago Baiba Skride came to Cleveland to perform the Bruch concerto at Blossom. Sweet tone, solid technique and a calm presence on stage without any crowd pleasing histrionics. Again, she would have been a good role model for the young competitors! I sometimes wonder who are the young violinists listening to - and watching - with their strange stage manner. Maybe it's just the sign of the times?

Conducting a violin sectional at Kent State University

Cleveland's own Blossom Music Festival is almost halfway done, and it has so far been full of fun events like the performance of Pirates of the Caribbean with live orchestral accompaniment, and great guest artists such as Hans Graf and Jeff Kahane. I have mostly been covering the concerts and assisting our guest conductors, but the most fun part of my summer was working with the Kent/Blossom Chamber Orchestra.

Kent/Blossom Music is a month long summer course with emphasis on chamber music with added one week of orchestra rehearsals leading to a concert on Blossom Pavilion stage. Most of the teachers are seasoned orchestra professionals (many of them Cleveland Orchestra principals) so it is a good mix for anyone who is thinking of becoming an orchestra musician. The students come from all over the US and also overseas as far as from China, Korea and Japan.

For our program I had chosen some melancholic Finnish music - four Sibelius pieces from his incidental music to Arvid Järnefelt's play "Kuolema" ("Death"). They were largely unknown to the students, which is no wonder since usually only the first of the pieces, Valse Triste, is played outside Finland. The other movements are Scene with Cranes, Canzonetta and Valse Romantique, all very beautiful music. To balance all that sadness we concluded our program with Prokofiev's sparkling first symphony ("Classical").

During our rehearsal week I was suddenly overwhelmed by additional work - performing some new music in concerts to raise more funds to support the Kent/Blossom summer program. Luckily I was also having my friend and colleague Tong Chen over for the week, and I could assign her some sectionals as well as preparing the students to play Mussorgski's "Pictures at an Exhibition" together in a side-by-side with The Cleveland Orchestra and David Zinman.

I was extremely happy about the progress we made during the two last days, and at the concert the orchestra totally took off! Everyone was having great fun it seemed! We got also some really good press and a nice blog review. I'd like to thank everyone for their hard work - the students, their teachers, everyone who helped at the rehearsals and sectionals. Let's do this again at the next Blossom Festival!