the sydney international piano competition 2004

[cziffra]

did anyone watch or hear any of this?  i would be interested to hear opinions on the final prizewinners.  i thought they were all good but i can't say i entirely agree with the order...
i saw john chen live after his win and i didn't feel like i was watching the winner of an international competition, but rather, a very good teeanage pianist.  for example, the video e60m has posted of himself playing islamey was equal to, if not better than, john chen's.  
any thoughts?

[Tash]

yeah i went and watched some days of it and i didn't think john chen should've won cos Rem Urasin was my fave. didn't really like Ayano Shimada, thought Alexander Lubianstev was the cutest.

go rem he's the bomb! he played at the church near my old school and i was like OMG i have to go except i was at uni so couldn't make it:(

[jeff]

i saw john and rem in solo recitals after the competition, and i also thought rem was much better. although, when i heard him play on the radio - during the competition - in the first stage, i thought he played well, but i really didn't like what he did with the pieces in his second stage recital.  :-/ i think he was probably just more suited to the repertoire he did in first stage.


"the video e60m has posted of himself playing islamey"

where is this?

[Tash]

did you hear rem play the chopin sonata in one of the later rounds? it was so beautiful and i was sitting in the front row like 2metres away from him i'm like omg i am in love with your playing. and he was fascinating to watch- like he didn't smile or anything, looked like he came from the 19th century or something! i want to marry a russian musician now *stares dreamily into space*

[janice]

i want to marry a russian musician now *stares dreamily into space*

Oh I know, I want to marry a man who has nice hands and has an accent *sits next to Tash, and they stare dreamily into space together*  LOL

[cziffra]

"the video e60m has posted of himself playing islamey"

where is this?

where's bernard when you need him? sorry, i don't remember...

[bernhard]

where's bernard when you need him? sorry, i don't remember...

Have a look here:

https://www.pianoforum.net/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=repo;action=display;num=1074964731;start=5
(reply # 5)

[brewtality]

i went to the final day at the Opera house. I thought that John Chen's rach3 was excellent he demonstrated a great technique (i counted about 3 minor mistakes) and i also loved the musicality of his performance although i would have prefered it if he had played the short cadenza. IMO he out-played Rem Urasin in this section. i was really glad i found out about this (1 week before) it was great to get to see performances of Rach2, Tchaik 1, and Rach3.

[Tash]

ooooh i was at that too! how funny we were in the same place at the same time! yeah it was nice to hear those three concertos- i took my sister with me and she got excited with the rach2 and tchaikovsky1 cos she'd seen people dance to them and thus they had some form of ballet-ish significance to her. yeah john chen was good in that section, but i still think rem had more sensitivity and feeling in his playing.

[punter]

Sorry I'm a bit late. 

I saw the 1st 4 days at the Seymour Centre, I was in the 2nd row directly side on with the piano!

I agree Rem was the best, although I think the best thing I saw live was the young russian Alexander Lubiantsev playing Scriabins 5th sonata.  That was amazing!

[Tash]

ha Alexander was the cutest i wanted to take him home and adopt him!!! yeah how good was it having it at the seymour centre cos the room wasn't incredibly massive and so it was nice and intimate and you got to be so close to the piano! (yay to my teacher getting first row directly in front of the piano, i was like a metre away from the pianists!)

[janice]

oh my--so tash was in the first row, and punter was in the 2nd row!!  It sounds like it must be a fairly small, cozy auditorium or room, so do you guys think that you might have seen each other?  This is really cool!

[Tash]

no well punter was there the first week and i didn't rock up til the 2nd week so we probably didn't see each other but it would've been funny if we had!

[brewtality]

Lubianstev seemed like such a kid, I couldn't believe that he was only 10 months younger than me.
btw did anyone see the streets of rage (peirs lane) play the opening recital?
i would have liked to have gone. if only i lived in Sydney   

[galonia]

I listened to most of the recitals on the radio.  My favourite was also Rem Urasin.  He played  the four Chopin Mazurkas Op. 24 in the semi-finals, and the intensity of his playing was incredible.  I was at the Opera House for the Mozart concertos, and Rem was outstanding - it sounded as though he was speaking to each person individually with his playing.  I wasn't that impressed by John Chen's Mozart.

For the 19th/20th Century concertos, I thought Daniel Hill's Prokofiev was outstanding.  I didn't think Rem played the Tchaikovsky that well.  John Chen's Rachmaninoff was definitely very good.  Although since the last round involves both the Mozart and the 19th/20th C concertos, and I thought Urasin's Mozart was so good, and his Tchaikovsky was not so bad, that I was very much surprised when the 1st prize eventually went to Chen.

I attended Urasin's recital at Hunters Hill Town Hall (incredible - a solo piano recital was sold out!) and it was superb.  He's rather dedicated to Chopin.

I also attended Chen's recital at the Sydney Town Hall.  I find his slow playing needs more breadth and intensity - he tends to lose me during his slow playing and I start to fidget.  But Chen is incredibly relaxed when he performs.  It's like he has no nervousness at all.

Of the pianists that didn't make it to the finals, I was really impressed by Masataka Takada - he has this wonderfully clear touch that was so beautiful.

Well, that's just my two cents.

[punter]

Rem was a prizewinner in the Chopin competition in 1995, i guess it shows.  I heard his 3rd sonata on radio which was pretty awesome.

I saw the Piers Lane recital, it was ok, i especially liked the Rach variations on theme of Chopin.

guess me and Tash didn't see each other, but it was amazing how many people i ran into that i knew, and hadn't seen for years, including my old maths leturer!

[Tash]

oh yeah rem playing the chopin sonata i got to see that it was beautiful. i only listened to piers lane on the radio and was in my sister's room at the time and thus we were distracting each other so can't really remember much about it....
i didn't see anyone i knew there! except my piano teacher but that's cos she took me, and a friend of mine, but that's cos i took her. maybe i just don't know enough people!