2017 Cliburn jury has no full-time piano teachers

The Cliburn on Wednesday announced the jurors for its 2017 competition, and there are no full-time piano teachers on the list.

Instead, the Cliburn has asked eight professional concert pianists to join the jury chairman, maestro Leonard Slatkin, in evaluating the 30 young pianists in the 15th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, set for May 25 through June 10, 2017, in Fort Worth.

“One of the key mandates of the Cliburn is to launch a real career in the music world, and who can judge the best tools to achieve this career better than people who are already in a sustainable career?” Cliburn CEO and President Jacques Marquis said.

The jury includes new adjudicators Arnaldo Cohen (Brazil), Jean-Philippe Collard (France), Anne-Marie McDermott (USA), Marc-André Hamelin (Canada) and Alexander Toradze (USA/Georgia). Also chosen were Mari Kodama (Japan) and Christopher Elton (United Kingdom), who were on the jury of this year’s inaugural Cliburn junior competition. The only returning juror from the 2013 competition is pianist Joseph Kalichstein of Israel.

The Cliburn has been criticized for having too many students of jurors in the competition, raising questions about fairness. In 2013, nine of the 30 competitors were current or former students of jurors. Four such students advanced to the semifinal, and Beatrice Rana, a student of juror Arie Vardi, won the silver medal.

Slatkin acknowledged that while the 2017 jurors may have a few students, their primary focus is on their concert careers. Elton, who taught at the Royal Academy of Music in London for more than two decades, stepped down as head of its piano department in 2011.

“There has been so much controversy with every competition about teachers who have students in the competition itself. And in some ways, it’s unavoidable once in a while, but this has at least helped,” Slatkin said.

Changes to auditions

The screening auditions will be held in January and February 2017 in Shanghai; Moscow; Hanover, Germany; Budapest, Hungary; New York; Fort Worth; and, new this competition, London. For the first time since 1977, the screening jury will not include anyone who is also on the competition jury.

The screening jurors are pianists Dmitri Alexeev (Russia), Michel Beroff (France), Janina Fialkowska (Canada/Poland), Jamie Parker (Canada) and Pamela Paul (USA).

Format changes

Competition juror Hamelin will compose a commissioned work for the 2017 competition. The commissioned piece has usually been performed during a piano recital in the semifinal, but the Cliburn has decided that all the competitors will play the four- to six-minute piece during the first round.

“Everybody is on the same footing from the start in terms of having one piece that nobody knows,” Slatkin said. “It is really a brilliant way to listen to all the entrants.”

Other changes include:

▪ Adding a quarterfinal round in which 20 competitors will perform a 45-minute solo recital.

▪ Having each semifinalist perform a Mozart concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and conductor Nicholas McGegan.

▪ Moving the chamber music piece, which will be played with the Brentano String Quartet, from the semifinal to the final.

Marquis said the changes will challenge the competitors while giving them the chance to show jurors and the audience their musicianship.

“The jurors will get more information in the process with the two recitals, the Mozart and the chamber piece and the big concerto,” Marquis said.

The competition jury

Leonard Slatkin, jury chairman (USA)

Arnaldo Cohen (Brazil)

Jean-Philippe Collard (France)

Christopher Elton (United Kingdom)

Marc-André Hamelin (Canada)

Joseph Kalichstein (Israel)

Mari Kodama (Japan)

Anne-Marie McDermott (USA)

Alexander Toradze (USA/Georgia)

This story was originally published September 16, 2015 at 10:02 AM with the headline "2017 Cliburn jury has no full-time piano teachers."