The Glocal Piano Project, Vol. II!

Glocal Piano Project proves to be a great success – finalists of the 64th Busoni Piano Competition have been chosen

(Bolzano, November 25, 2022) After three logistically challenging weeks, the Glocal Piano Project in cooperation with Steinway & Sons, which replaced the former pre-selections of the Busoni Piano Competition, has been concluded successfully.

Over a period of 10 days (November 6 to 16), the Bolzano-based Busoni competition held a hybrid form of its first round of the competition in 12 cities on three continents: the 20-minute contributions by the 100 pianists admitted to participate were professionally recorded following identical technical specifications and published online on both the Busoni website and that of Steinway & Sons.

This video pool served as the basis for the evaluation for 7 jurors who were set the task to select 26 participants for the upcoming finals in the summer 2023. At the same time, 35.000 users made use of the opportunity to watch the performances online to get a picture of the artistic diversity and quality of young up-and-coming pianists. Up to four additional candidates could be selected through the audience’s vote. Due to overlap with the jury's verdict, 3 finalists ended up being chosen by10.657 registered users. The videos will remain available at www.busoni-mahler.eu until the start of the final round in 2023.

Unlike 2021, when the Glocal Piano Project was conceived as a response to lock downs and travel restrictions, this year live audiences were able to attend the performances at almost all venues - the Steinway & Sons branches in turn became "embassies" of the Busoni competition all around the world, from New York to London, from Paris to Seoul. The international visibility of the profiled competition was able to benefit greatly.

This year's jury consisted of seven renowned pianists and stakeholders of the classical music business:

Hinrich Alpers (jury chairman), Antonii Baryshevskyi, Maria Grazia Bellocchio, Andrey Gugnin, Claire Huangci, Chloë Herteleer and Ingolf Wunder. They independently judged the recorded live performances and determined the group of up to 26 pianists invited to take part in the forthcoming Busoni competition finals.

Another notable feature was the fact that the organizing Busoni-Mahler Foundation dispensed with all national symbols like indications of citizenship, flags etc. This measure reflects the conviction that musicians are individual personalities, representing their interpretive position, not their nationality. The vision of the competition is thus in harmony with the intellectual legacy of the namesake himself, because Ferruccio Busoni was not only an outstanding artistic personality of modernism, but also saw himself as a Weltbürger who maintained his own network of protagonists and supporters of the avant-garde.

Next stage of Bolzano-based Busoni Competition

The recorded performances of all participants will remain accessible online until August 2023, when the competition is scheduled to conclude with the traditional final stages in Bolzano, Italy. As in previous years, these stages will involve two solo stages, a chamber music stage with an aspiring string quartet – in 2023 the New York-based Isidore Quartet, recent winner of first prize at the Banff String Quartet Competition – followed by the grand Finalissima with the Haydn Orchestra. Artistic director Peter Paul Kainrath insists that: “A music competition today needs to pursue a greater vision beyond defining itself as a simple “race” for awards; it needs to be transformed into a platform for a global audience and stakeholders in international music life so as to ensure the best possible visibility for all participating talents.”

Competition rules and prize money

The new competition rules include an increasingly challenging repertoire list, including the preparation of two concertos with orchestra, while the money for the first prize – donated by the City of Bolzano – has been increased to €30,000. All special prizes, totalling over €60,000, will be awarded in August 2023.

#Musicbeyondnationalism

The world is currently facing a devastating new reality caused by unthinkable threats made in the name of national interests. As a committed member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions (WFIMC), the Busoni Competition emphasises that young musicians are taking part in competitions as individuals and not as representatives of any nation. As much as a single piece of music may have, legitimately, national or regional cultural roots and influences, music as a whole is ultimately a universal medium and thereby expresses universal values. Moreover, an artistic career in the realm of classical music transcends nationality – the Busoni-Mahler Foundation consequently detaches itself from all political ideology, condemns the instrumentalisation of the arts and artists by any political regime, and instead strives for diversity while abstaining from all indications of nationality or nationalist symbolism.

The Busoni Competition and Steinway Prizewinner Concerts Network

Since its establishment in 2007, the Busoni Competition has been a member of the Steinway Prizewinner Concerts Network. Thanks to the network, 49 award winners have represented the competition at 25 international concert halls in 8 countries. As a result of this fruitful cooperation Jae Hong Park, the current Premio Busoni, edition received invitations to play at Gewandhaus Leipzig, at BASF Kulturell (Germany), in Esch (Luxembourg, European Culture Capital 2022) and was also offered a tour of six cities in his native South Korea.