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I will be participating at the Concours this year.
Which will be my first competition ever.

Has anyone been to Concours before?

If so, since I have never been in a competition before, I would greatly appreciate your advice on what to expect, information about the general ambiance, suggestions, etc...

Regards,

Hakki.

Just wanted to wish you the best of luck. I've seen your YouTube channel and hope you make it to the finals. I can't offer any advice since I'm relatively new to playing.

Cheers!

Expect to love it. They seem to take extra pains to be welcoming to people from outside France and Europe, really trying hard to make you feel at home, and they succeed. I am sure that Mr. Bekerman (the main organizer) and the whole staff will be very solicitous toward you. Much of the event is simply beautiful. A highlight is the spectacular settings that they use for the finals -- different places in different years, and always fabulous.

I also wish you luck to make the finals -- but I would advise not thinking about that too much, and focusing just on trying to get past the 1st round and feeling very happy if you just do that. I mean look -- most people don't! It's hard to imagine in advance how important this will feel -- I sure didn't -- and I guarantee you that it's true. It's easy to sort of take the 1st round for granted and figure that the real action starts later on, but really the 1st round is the most important. Remember also that when you sit down to play your first piece, it will be your introduction to all these people, and their impression of you will be very much determined by it. This is true for any event, especially if you aren't known to the people there. Pick something for your first piece that you feel totally comfortable with, and give a lot of attention to the opening. We often forget that people form an impression of us pretty quickly. Put your best foot forward, and don't be worrying about some "hard part" that comes later on in the piece. By then, their minds will already be sort of made up.

As I said in the "Chicago" thread, a unique aspect of this competition is that you sometimes get interrupted in the middle of a piece and get asked to play something else from your list. I talked about it over here.

A couple of important things that might not be obvious from the materials:

-- You can change your repertoire up until the last minute.
-- There's a round called the "quarter finals" between the 1st round and the semifinals. Some people are passed from the 1st round directly to the semifinals -- usually about 8 -- but more go through the quarter-finals -- about 12-15, and a few of those then get passed to the semifinals. You should be very happy if you just make the quarter-finals, and thrilled if you make the semifinals.

Another unique aspect......Other competitions prefer that you not repeat pieces from round to round, and actually most forbid it. But this event likes you to repeat pieces and usually sort of "makes" you do it. It seems that their aim in each round is to be looking for who has pieces that will make the finals a great event -- everything is geared toward the finals. Anything you play in any round that is terrific, they'll be wanting you to play in the finals if you get there. If you do make it, expect them to basically tell you what to play -- and listen to them.

There's somewhat of a stereotype of "French" playing -- we had a discussion about it here recently, with some people saying there's no such thing, but they were wrong.
And it seems the judges at the Concours have a definite preference for what we might call "French" playing but which we could also call just sensitive playing. For example, I would guess that your Bach concerto would have gone over very well with these judges; your Mephisto Waltz (as per the youtube contest) would probably have been seen as too brash. I loved it; they probably wouldn't have.

Finally: The event is unique in still more ways. Of all the amateur competitions, this is the one where the "strangest" things happen, including (apparently) politics and favoritism of various kinds. Nevertheless, IMO it works on its own level, because there are more than enough compensating factors, and even the politics and favoritism have their charm; I've gotten a few laughs out of it. Go there, have a great time, put your best foot forward, don't necessarily take everything seriously -- and be thrilled if you just make the quarter-finals. It will be a great accomplishment, especially for a first competition.

Good luck!

Wow, that's some really useful information, Mark_C!
I guess it would have shocked me quite a bit if I was interrupted in the middle of playing without being mentally prepared for it

I'll also be participating, and like Hakki (whom I look forward to meet and have exchanged PMs already) it's my first amateur competition ever. I'm quite (positively) excited!

Btw, I also like the their use of the word "anti-competition" to emphasize that this event is not only about winning, but also a nice way to meet like-minded piano geeks.

Anyone else from Piano World will be there?

Hey wait a minute, what's with the piano geeks thing?

Well, having 100 people from around the world together who are all crazy about classical piano music. That's certainly a better quote than in my everyday life

I was referring to this snippet from their website:

OT, but could someone provide me a link to this discussion that Mark_C mentioned? Thank you!

Thank you very much Mark for the very detailed information and advice you have given. This is really very valuable.

About this "French" style playing (which I have read also from the other post you have mentioned):

Do you mean Mephisto Waltz itself is not suitable for this competition, or is it the way I play it?
If the latter, how should I play it to sound like the so-called "French" style?
I mean, I am finding it difficult to play such a piece in a gentle, elegant, flowing way, since it has many abrupt changes, skips, leaps, ff and fff passages etc..
Or are you suggesting that I should play another piece instead?

Regards,

Hakki.

So, you did know exactly what I meant!
(Yes, that's it.)

And yes indeed, a piece like the Mephisto Waltz has much in it that seems to go against those qualities. But not really -- they can still be present. Do you not agree, and would you not say that your approach in the youtube was more 'aggressive'? (I didn't mean that it's just a bad piece to play at this thing -- but it's particularly risky for this reason that we're talking about, not just how hard the piece is.)

Here you go!

....and in this post on that thread, I talked about how I tried to take this into account when I played in the Concours for the first time. It wasn't a real good idea. I think it's good to know what kind of playing they seem to value, but not real good to suddenly try to play differently.

Cool! And best of luck to you too!!!!

Mark_C, Thank you for the link! It was an interesting read. Now whenever I listen to French pianists, I'll see if I can distinguish "the french sound"

Mark, I might have been too quick in my previous response.

I tried to play the Mephisto Waltz in the so-called French style, and realized that it is indeed possible to play it like that too.

fffs changed to fs and ffs changed to mfs. I slowed down the tempo just a little bit, added some slight extra pedals here and there, and also removed some extensive pedaling where justified.
Voila! it is there, gentle, elegant and flowing.

Now I have a month to get used to this new style.

Thanks again.

Regards,

Hakki

Could you maybe post a video or audio of your playing after you get used to playing it with the French style? I'd like to hear how different it would sound.

Well, it doesn't work that way.

Not all French pianists play that way. And lots and lots of non-French people do.

Interesting! And yes, it sounds like that's most of it. And above all, this one word:

"grace"

That will just about take care of everything.

BTW, important question: Do you like the piece that way?
If not, don't do it.

OK.........
This thing here isn't the Mephisto Waltz, it's not by a French composer (Arensky), and neither of the 2 people playing it are French (Bauer, Gabrilowitsch), but I'd say it's a good example of a waltz in 'the French style':



If Hakki can get some of that quality into the Mephisto Waltz, he could win.

What a great piece! Don't want to admit, but I was unaware of Arensky until now. I'm going to listen to more of his pieces from now on (yay for youtube).
I think I started to get a feel of what the french style is like, after listening to a couple other performances of this waltz. My impression is that overall it sounds more pretty. Would Horowitz be considered the polar opposite of french playing?

I wasn't either until I came across that piece on an album. And I never heard a piece of his at a concert until just recently (which was what brought this piece back to mind). Don't feel bad -- he's very little known. I think most professional musicians probably haven't heard of him.


Good and interesting question.
I think the answer is "yes and no." Much of his playing was extremely delicate and elegant, and he had as wonderful a range of pianissimos, as anyone, so.....no, he's not the polar opposite. Yeah, we could say that much of what he did was very "un-French." But he didn't play favorites; much of his playing was un-anything that we could mention. The polar opposite of "French playing" would be someone who plays heavy all the time, and un-nuanced.

P.S. I think Horowitz would have had trouble getting past the 1st round of an amateur competition.

I totally agree!