Triple role for Teppo Koivisto

In addition to the contestants and the jury, there are in the Maj Lind Piano Competition a few other musicians who have been putting in long working hours over the past week. One of them is pianist and piano lecturer Teppo Koivisto, whose comments on the competition have been heard each night on YLE Radio 1. This is not the first time Teppo has assumed the role of commentator, for he did the same job in the previous Maj Lind Competition in 2002 and he was the TV commentator for the national Jyväskylä Piano Competition in 2004.

Koivisto got asked to do the job by an editor friend of his. “I already knew Laila Kangas from YLE. I was doing a radio programme called Music Club when she asked me if I’d be interested,” he reports. The Maj Lind Competition was already an arena familiar to him, for in 1982 he shared the second prize in it with Olli Mustonen.

The first and second rounds were hard work for the radio commentator. “First you spend the whole day sitting listening, then in the evening you do the radio programme.” Teppo is not complaining, however. “I’d probably have followed the competition in any case. Now I just had to keep more on the ball, knowing I’d have to make public pronouncements.” Life became a little easier for the commentator once the second round was over. The contestants have been whittled down to six. “The first round was most tiring, because I was listening to new players all the time. By now I have formed a picture of all the players.”

Koivisto in fact has a triple role in the Maj Lind Piano Competition: commentator, member of the competition committee and teacher. Representing his pupils in the finals is Marko Mustonen. Is there any reason to suspect that his own pupils will get gentler treatment on the air? “On the contrary,” he insists. “I am almost more critical of my own pupils.”

Jukka Nykänen