Leeds...Fanny Waterman

[pianowelsh]

Hi All, As Leeds comes around again. It is once again a joy to see Fanny Waterman head up the jury of one of the world's greatest piano competitions at 86!!! amazing. Id really like to know if any of you have had any lessons/studies with her and perhaps some of your impressions of the Dame.

[zheer]

  I remember watching this competition on TV as a teenager, loved it. You know its open everyone from the age of 30 and under,but the standard is so high that most people dont make it to the first round, anyway the piece you have to play in each round are less difficult than one would imagin.BTW the competiton will be shown on TV again on 22 of september. Yepeeeeeeeee

[pianowelsh]

Zheer - what do you mean the pieces are less difficult. Are we calling works like the Chopin sonatas Liszt sonata Bartok sonatas etc easy now? Maybe the whole forum just evolved over night and left the rest of the world behind.  Its really more a stamina issue for the Leeds you have to show everything you can do in several gruelling rectial rounds and then come out fresh as a daisy and play a concerto with a top orchestra on worldwide tv.

[pianowelsh]

Really i suppose my question was more about Fanny Waterman really rather than the Leeds itself. Anyone personally experienced her teaching??

[elspeth]

I haven't had lessons with Fanny but I do know her slightly through work and a friend of mine at university studied with her. He really liked her teaching, and I've found her friendly and approachable.

I'm currently working on the LPC, getting paid to listen to recitals. It's a hard life... the piano they're using for the initial rounds isn't brilliant though, the touch is a bit heavy and it's not helping the competitors. The one in the Town Hall they'll play for the concerto finals is a lot better.

[pianowelsh]

Thanks Elspeth. Thats really helpfull. Do you know if she still does a lot of teaching? It would be really interesting to hear her in a lesson with her wealth of experience. Do you know if she takes private students? She seemed a very warm person... I just got back from the Leeds semi finals!!! I probably passed you !! I have to say I was very taken with mr Sunwook Kim! I loved his Scriabin - it floated out of the piano - brilliant. I thought the Chinese guy was extremely talented too mr Song I believe.. Mindue they were all good that have gone through to the final... the other Mr Kim certainly made a 'big' impression - his Liszt was wonderfull and His polonaise was pretty white hot but I have to say I found him difficult to watch in the Bach and the out of tune singing along did smack a little of Gould!! but Im prepared to forgive him that. Really enjoyed Grace's playing too and she chooses such interesting programmes.

[elspeth]

As of when I was at uni (I graduated in 2000) Fanny still took private students, of whom my friend was one... I couldn't tell you if she still does. I'm pretty sure she's still teaching, people like Ben Frith still list her as their teacher. He's well worth hearing, he does a lot of accompanying but sometimes plays in his own rite.

My favourite in the finals is the Russian, Denis Kozhukhin, I loved his performance. Particularly the Rachmaninov. Although I have to say my favourite performance of the compulsory Britten nocturne was Andrew Brownell, I nearly enjoyed it when he played it. I can see why they used it but really, what a ghastly piece. Nobody I talked to in the audience seemed to like it.

[pianowelsh]

We'll have to see. Looking forward to the concerto's. Standard been very high this time.  I didnt hear Denis - I was really disapointed because everyone said he did well in semi round.  Of the ones I heard Sunwook stood out for me. He played with such intensity and such a beautifull variety of sounds... The Koreans are certainly kicking British ass at the moment (if you'll pardon the expression). I was really taken by siheng's Lizst too.. a notoriously difficult piece to pace and I though he did a wonderfull job. I also missed Nikita (what was he like?? Again id heard good reports but compared to the others how did he stand??)

[pianowelsh]

Yeah The RESULTS are out!!! Sunwook won !! Im so pleased he really deserved it.  The jury were really brave to give it to him, too being so young. Imagine going back to college next week and people asking - what did you do over summer -'oh well actually I won the Leeds International'!! HeHe - what a lark. We should be on a jury together Elspeth You choose Brownell and Denis and I plumped for Sunwook - between us we made the top 3!! I have to say I was disappointed with Denis in final.. I didnt think he did his best which is a shame because he is obviously very accomplished with Rachmaninov.. Maybe the pressure got to him a bit.  Siheng and Sung Hoon were also a bit disappointing for me - they were SO good in the semi's but somehow lost their sparkle by the final. Im not sure they actually choose the most appropriate concertos to show themselves off. Infact I couldnt help wondering what the result might have been had they swapped concertos with each other??! Musnt forget Grace - she is a very impressive artist and she goes for really interesting and thought provoking programmes. I like that.. She isnt afraid of the jury or audience perception - integrity - a good quality! I did feel that she was perhaps a little too understated for the final though - I think that may have let her down. Her semi final was not the best Ive heard her play so I wonder if perhaps the stamina might have been a bit of an issue???! Id love to hear her again.  Im looking forward to the next competition already!! I'll be in the que for signed cd by Sunwook when he comes here.   Hope you really enjoyed the final tonight! 

[elspeth]

Denis put in a stunner of a semi final, played Rach preludes and brought the house down with them... if they did an 'audience award' as an extra, minor prize I think he might well have got that. Although also, the judging goes on their performance throughout the competiton, maybe Denis didn't pick the best overall programme. It was very romantic-biased, some of the others had a bit more genre variety overall.

Talking to the audience, all the serious technical pianists liked Sunwook or Andrew but all the 'ordinary' people who just appreciate their music liked Denis. I think his performance skills were the best even if his concerto wasn't quite up to Sunwook or Andrew technically. Which raises an interesting point, who to pitch your music at when you're at that kind of level? You're arguably a better musician if you can appeal to the serious audience, but you make a lot more money and play a lot more concerts if you can get the popular audience...

[zheer]

  Well what did sunwook play with the orchestra.

[elspeth]

Brahms 1

[zheer]

Brahms 1

  Oooooooo, love that concerto, is sunwook a he or she, and am gessing but either Russian or Asian.

[elspeth]

Sunwook's an 18-yr old boy from Korea... Sickening, isn't it, to be that good so young!

[zheer]

Sunwook's an 18-yr old boy from Korea... Sickening, isn't it, to be that good so young!

  Sheesh, that is very young, no point entering  other competitions after leeds if you win, but do you know what usually happens, the person that came 3rd or 4th find themselve with an international concert career.

[pianowelsh]

I suspect a few competitions might be spawned this year. Both the Koreans, the Chinese and Denis and of course the American have distinct potential for greatness. Some exceptional performances in the semi's too that were not far off a finals place.. will be interesting to see how some of them develop.  i think you raise an interesting point elspeth about who to play to. Tis true taht perhaps because of the average age of classical music fans the melodic tonal music of the romantic era is the most popular with many turning their noses up and too much Bach (serious music) and a distinct distrust when it comes to modernist music.. I often hear people moan about 'this modern Debussy and Ravel stuff' - which are by no means 'hard core' or off putting.  The Leeds is great for the fact it allows for a huge scope and of course the audience at Leeds are actually more literate than most. Many are piano students/teachers...even pianists! and those who arent are the people who have classical fm and radio 3 on all the time at home and dabble in this and that. Yet even there there is a distrust and a lack of warmth for competitiors who set out to be contreversial or modern in their programme choices.  Its a shame because much of the work is very very good and if the younger generation folks dont play it who is going to?? someone needs to keep music ticking along and developing.. but finding an audience for it and introducing it to an audience is a very difficult situation. This is why so many competitions have compulsary comissioned works -- that way every pianist will have the composers work in their repertory.. the hope being that it will get a wider audience. I though the much maligned inclusion of the Britten set piece (comissioned for the 63 competition) was actually helpfull to the competitiors who wanted to take a more daring modernist stance as it acted as a gateway through which they could lead the listeners into wierd and wonderful sonorities.. In one way its a shame they have to almost have something to hide behind to do it.. but it did deffinately help several of them to showcase their strong areas of repertoire.  It was interesting to see how some reacted to it though it seemed to vere both ways .. either people relished the opportunity to break away from the barnstormers and lead their programme in a new direction OR they treated it as a total inconvenience and stuck it somewhere out of the way.  Shame the audience by and large hated the piece.. I have to say I enjoyed it!!! but then I have a tendancy towards lyrical pieces where you can really dig deep and find exciting tone colours and textures which this piece affords.  I think it perfectly fits the title of 'nocture' but with a more bartokian view of night time as the time when the moon is out and nature resounds. It was very interesting to hear different peoples treatments of it. There were some pretty fine performances. Partic Sunwook and Brownell.. they really commited to it as though it was as sepcial as the other pieces they'd prepared.. Not everyone showed the same level of attention to it. But when you make something mandatory that's always going to be the way isnt it.

[leahcim]

  Sheesh, that is very young, no point entering  other competitions after leeds if you win, but do you know what usually happens, the person that came 3rd or 4th find themselve with an international concert career.

I got the impression that some of those "age 27" that were further down the list, their last chance saloon status might have been part of selection? Given an age limit of 30 and 3 years between competitions. Not that they couldn't play, but all else being equal a younger guy gets another go in 3 years...

I'm a bit disappointed at getting the results before I've seen all the concertos [with the BBC that is, not with people posting it here]

Similarly there's much, much more that they could have shown of the run up and previous rounds - what's the point in having these dedicated channels like BBC 4 if they aren't taken full advantage of - I guess some of that might be the extra stress a camera crew might give contestants [although you won't win if you can't play in front of a big audience / camera]

Better than nothing though, plus they showing Shine and a documentary about the American who played Bach whilst sitting under the piano too.

[pianowelsh]

true the older ones possibly could have benefitted more but i think they had to recognise the young guys talent which is immense.  Most of the older ones have sufficient comp experience and pro engagements already to get a career up and running whereas sunwook has risen very rapidly and i think they wanted to recognise that he is now ready to go!

[elspeth]

What has struck me as curious about the TV coverage of the finals is that they're showing them in an odd order (Sunwook on Thursday night? So not in order they finished, but not in order they played either, as Grace was on on Wednesday night!) and in the commentary they're talking about  where that person might possibly finish... Considering they weren't broadcast until three days later, I'm sure it wouldn't have been outside the scope of the BBC to film the 'expert analysis' sections after the competition had finished, splice them in and then show the finalists in a sensible order.

[pianowelsh]

Thats the beeb for you!