XXIV Rina Sala Gallo International Piano Competition

Monza, September 25th - October 2nd 2016

XXIII Rina Sala Gallo International Piano Competition. Photography © Silvia Bavera

The Rina Sala Gallo Association is glad to announce the XXIV International Piano Competition, which will take place from September 25th 2016 to October 2nd 2016 at Teatro Manzoni in Monza, Italy. Applications for this biennial competition are online now at www.concorsosalagallo.it and are due from Jan. 15th 2016 to Apr. 10th 2016. Applicants must have been born on or Oct. 2nd 1985 and Sept. 25th 2001.

Vovka Ashkenazy is reconfirmed artistic director, while musicologist and artistic director Enzo Restagno will serve as Jury Chairman, and laVerdi Orchestra will perform with the finalists, on both the final round and at the winners' concert, on October 2nd.

“The Competition's renewed mission, states Artistic Director Vovka Ashkenazy, is to identity the youngest and most promising pianists from all around the world, in the very first phase of their professional careers, to appreciate their qualities and enhance their chances of success by supporting their creative efforts, alongside the economic commitment of their families, during this delicate 'rite of passage'. With this aim in mind, the 24th RSG will rely on the expertise of such pre-eminent international musicians as Bruno Canino, Jin Ju, Alexey Lebedev, Derek Han, Sunghoon Hwang, and Enrica Ciccarelli (with Lorenzo Di Bella as a possible stand-in) on the Jury. Enzo Restagno, the famous musicologist and artistic director will be our President. In accordance with the policies adopted by several major WFIMC competitions, our voting system will be based on a Yes/No-Pass/Stop procedure up until the final round. This will facilitate both the work flow of all the participants, and the overall communication process. The Prize winners, as usual, will be chosen through an in-depth deliberation among jurors”.

Prizes include checks and grants for a total amount of 31'500 euros and a series of concerts, to be held by the winner in Italy's most important classical music seasons and concert halls, through all 2016 and 2017. The first prize Città di Monza winner will receive a check of € 15.000, the second prize Credito Artigiano will receive € 7.500 and the third prize Rotary Club di Monza, € 5.000. Grants include the Rina Sala Gallo Associazione € 2.000 prize and Prof. Emma Sirtori Bonetti Bach prize, for the best interpretation of Bach on the third round.

Video screening. A screening jury will select the competitors through online applications and video submissions, which will include one Prélude and Fuge from J.S. Bach's Well Tempered Klavier, one Chopin étude, one étude by either Liszt, Schumann, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff, Ligeti or Godowsky, and a short work written on or after 1900. The jury will also select max 5 candidates among WFIMC competitions' first and second prizes winners, who will be exempt from participating to such screening. These applicants must apply from January 15th till April 10th 2016.

First round will include a Mozart or Haydn Sonata, and a work by Chopin (chosen among Ballades, Barcarole, Polonaise and Scherzi); second round includes a Beethoven Sonata and a work by either Brahms, Chopin, Liszt, Schumann or Schubert. Third round will be a free, six pieces recital.

Final. The final round will be based on the interpretation of a piano and orchestra Concerto by either Mozart, Beethoven, Grieg, Schumann, Brahms, Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninov, Mendelssohn, Skriabin, Tchaikovsky or Ravel. Competitors will be accompanied by Milano's Orchestra Sinfonica Giuseppe Verdi conducted by Ruben Jais.

All competitors (max. 33) will be announced to the public on May 10th 2016.

Competitors who wish so might be housed in Monza's volunteers and supporters apartments and will be equipped with a piano, while any accompanying person must provide for themselves.

Complete rules, requirements and all rounds' detailed programmes can be found at www.concorsosalagallo.it

The Rina Sala Gallo International Piano Competition

Rina Sala Gallo (1898-1980) was a pupil of Giovanni Anfossi, under whose tutelage she graduated, at a very young age, and with a special commendation, from the Conservatorio “G. Verdi” in Milan. She began her career as a concertist at around ten, immediately arousing the audiences and critics approval,, and went on touring Italy and in Europe, and ontinuing to enjoy the same wave of success. Sala Gallo dedicated her life to the art of pianism, and founded a renowned piano school in Monza. In 1947, together with Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli and other exponents of the Italian music world, such as Tagliapietra, Gorini, Sanzogno, Vidusso, Alberto Mozzati and Margola, she founded the first Piano Competition ever organized in Monza. This first season was followed by another two, in 1949 and 1967. From 1970, the Competition became biennial and took her name. Since 2009, it is a member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions.

info@concorsosalagallo.it - Tel/Fax +39 (0)39 23 13 326

Biographies

After completing his musical studies at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, Vovka Ashkenazy, who is of Russian and Icelandic parentage, made his debut in London at the Barbican Centre in 1983 with the London Symphony Orchestra under Richard Hickox, with whom he performed Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto. Since then, Vovka Ashkenazy's career has taken him all across Europe, and to Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the Americas. He has participated in the Marlboro Festival in Vermont, as well as the Edinburgh and Spoleto festivals. Orchestras he has appeared with include nearly all the major British orchestras as well as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Australian Chamber, and the Berlin Symphony Orchestras. Conductors he has worked with include Semyon Bychkov, Martin Fischer-Dieskau and Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, at venues such as the Hollywood Bowl, the Sydney Opera House, the Berlin Philharmonic and the Royal Festival Hall, London.

Vovka Ashkenazy is very active as a chamber musician and has recorded a CD of Italian music with his brother, the clarinettist Dimitri Ashkenazy, together with whom he toured Japan in 1997, 2000 and 2002. The year 2001 saw the start of a new piano-duo partnership with Greek virtuoso pianist, Vassilis Tsabropoulos. This duo has already performed at the Piano en Valois festival and twice at the Athens Megaron. Vovka Ashkenazy has also worked together with the Reykjavík Wind Quintet and has released a CD with them on the Chandos label. A second CD is due out this year.

Alongside his concert activities, Vovka Ashkenazy also devotes his time to teaching. He has given master classes in Australia, Denmark, England, Greece, Guatemala, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and the U.S. and he has recently become a member of the chamber music coaching staff at Pro Corda in the UK. He was Professor of Piano at the Conservatoire Gabriel Fauré in Angoulême, France, from 1998 – 2007.

Vovka Ashkenazy lives in Switzerland and gives regular masterclasses in Italy.

Enzo Restagno has studied Philosophy in Turin and Venice. He has taught Muisc History at Turin's Conservatorio “Giuseppe Verdi” for 37 years. He is a regular contributor to “Stampa sera”, “La Repubblica”, “Le Monde de la Musique”, “Die Zeit”, “L'Espresso”, Radio RAI, Radio France, Westdeutsche Rundfunk, and BBC. He holds lessons and masterclasses in Europe, USA and Asia.

As a scholar, his interests include modern and contemporary music, in which fields he is regarded as a one of the world's preeminent specialists. He has published books on Luigi Nono, Luciano Berio, Hans Werner Henze, Elliott Carter, Ligeti, Xenakis, Petrassi, Donatoni, Sofia Gubaidulina, Alfred Schnittke, Steve Reich, Louis Andriessen, Peter Maxwell Davies, Arvo Paert, that were translated to many languages. He is Edizioni Ricordi's counselor for contemporary music.

He also is a passionate music organizer, who believes in the incredible power of such activities to the aim of cultural promotion. He has been artistic director and counselor for Emilia Romagna's Orchestra Sinfonica “Arturo Toscanini”, Bergamo and Brescia's “Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli” international piano festival, Orchestra della RAI in Turin and, from 1986 “Torino Settembre Musica” which he trasformed, in 20 years of activity, in one of the most important festival worldwide, which lead to the foundation of MITO SettembreMusica in 2007.