Chinese Music

shuttler · Mar 30, 2014

Winners Announced at the DCS International Piano Competition 2014

Kyle Orth, who performed Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 2, will receive a cash prize of $1,500 and a concert engagement to perform his piano concerto with the Dallas Chamber Symphony in the autumn of 2014 at Dallas City Performance Hall.

Lizhen Wu claimed the Second Prize, and will receive a cash award of $1,000 for his performance of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor. Soeun Lee took Third Prize, and will receive a cash award of $500 for her performance of Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No. 1.

Finalists Yang Ding and Moye Chen both received Honorable Mentions for their performance of Liszt’s Totentanz, and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, respectively. Both will receive a cash prize of $400.

The DCS International Piano Competition was held in three rounds at Caruth Auditorium at Southern Methodist University’s Owen Arts Center March 13-15, 2014. The Dallas Chamber Symphony presents its annual International Piano Competition in community partnership with the SMU Meadows School of the Arts. Jurors Deniz Arman Gelenbe, Petronel Malan and Roger Lord adjudicated the competition.

Quarter-finalists of the competition took advantage of opportunities to work with the Meadows School’s piano
faculty, including public master classes taught by Joaquin Achucarro and Dr. Carol Leone.

Link

2014 Young Artist Competition Winners
03.16.2014
The Emilio del Rosario Music Foundation is pleased to announce the results of the final round of the First International Young Artist Piano Concerto Competition, which was held on March 15, 2014 in Chicago Symphony Center:

First Prize - Chaeyoung Park - Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major
Second Prize - George Harliono - Liszt Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat Major
Third Prize - Haoguo Chen - Chopin Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor

The following pianists, listed alphabetically, received an Honorable Mention from the semifinal round judges:

Nadia Azzi - Rachmaninoff Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini
Aaron Kurz - Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major

LINK

shuttler · Apr 25, 2014

Bass wins role in Mozart classic
Updated: 2014-04-17 11:21
China Daily USA

Life keeps getting sweeter for 李鳌 Ao Li.

Fresh from emerging as a winner in New York's prestigious Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions singing competition, the 26-year-old bass-baritone has been hired by the Met as an understudy in the opera company's production of Don Giovanni.

The native of Dezhou, Shandong province and a resident of San Francisco, "accepted an offer to cover (the opera term for understudy) the role of Masetto in next season's performances of Don Giovanni, which runs from February 4 to March 6, 2015," Sam Neuman, the Met's associate press director, said.

In a phone interview from the San Francisco airport where he was waiting to board a China-bound plane, Li called his latest achievement "very unbelievable".

"I never thought I would be singing here (at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts)," he said. Rehearsals for the opera, one of the most-performed in history, start in January.

With music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte, Don Giovanni is the story of Don Juan, the mythical seducer. Although critics heaped scorn upon Mozart's work in its day, it eventually came to be regarded as a masterpiece.

Two weeks ago, when Li prevailed as one of five winners in the Met singing competition, he performed a Don Giovanni aria that is sung by Leporello, the title character's servant. "In San Francisco, I did Don Giovanni two years ago," Ao Li said. "I put this role in my resume." The competition's other Chinese winner was Yi Li, a 29-year-old tenor and Jinan, Shandong, native who lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Asked for comment on Ao Li's selection for the role, Neuman told China Daily the opera company "doesn't comment on specific singers".

Li already was busy as a performer before his victorious competition appearance. "But after the competition, I got more contracts," he said.

Once back in China he will teach at Shandong Normal University, where he also studied. He also will perform in a contemporary classical opera, singing in Mandarin at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing, and perform in a classical music festival in St. Petersburg, Russia.

He said he is looking forward to being reunited with family members. "I traveled a lot so I missed my family," he said. He'll also be filling out paperwork to get US permanent-resident status, a condition of his employment contract with the Met.

As an understudy, Li's job will be to substitute for the regular singer on short notice, if necessary. "If I'm lucky, I'll get in the show," he said.

After winning the Met competition, Li revealed in a New York radio interview that he broke into tears the first time he visited the Met and saw the iconic fountain in the Lincoln Center plaza that is often featured in the opening of opera-performance DVDs.

"Now I can stand on the Met stage," he said, proudly.

LINK

Watch the winner sings a beautiful Chinese number here:
大江东去 The grand river flows eastwards