Greetings

Hei Uki! Multakin onnitelut! Hienosti soitit toisessa erässä ja olisin mielelläni kuuntellut sun Beethoven 5. Jatkan englanniksi:

So, it is quite easy to play contemporary music in a personal way if some has the courage to become a little bit crazy said some nameless person. Prokofjev, Bartok, Stravinsky, and Skriabin are contemporary... and easy (Ligeti is however contemporary, and I guess everybody agree that the studies are not easy). But the rest? From which planet did you land to earth? Talk to P-L Aimard for example about easy contemporary music, and he'll laugh at you -probably for a reason.

The other comment about pppp. Well, Michelangeli was playing really soft and pppp, but I guess we'll never have the opportunity to critisize him ;-). Didn't disturb me -on the contrary, and to many Uki's Kilpiö was the best -and the only work where he used the ppppp a lot. But to Mr Blinov this makes us -and Uki's teachers of course- amateurs, doesn't it???

Cheers!

same for me gesa !!
Simon

Dear Uki,
I was deeply touched by your performance, a very rare feeling for me when I hear young pianists nowadays in competitions, and I know that I was not the only one!
All the best for you
Gesa

maybe courageous from yuri but not for you !
didn t sign !
Simon

I think Yuri was courageous to bring his thoughts (that nobody hasn't courage to say) on this site. My opinion is that some pianists in the semifinals are not of the technical (brilliant and professional) and musical level that is required in the semifinal of an international piano competition. "Edgy" and transparent Prokofjev, Bartok, Stravinsky ,Ligeti, Skriabin etc. don't need as brilliant technique and perfect, "round" touch as is required in some other composers' works (like Liszt, Chopin, Alkan...), this is only my opinion. I think also that it is quite easy to play contemporary music in a personal way if some has the courage to become a little bit crazy. We all are personalities.
If one doesn't have enough good pianistic skills it is naturally the only option to play modern works or pieces which are not technically so dangerous.

The comments you have written below make up a very sad read.

To begin with, describing someone who just beat you in a competition an amateur smells like a sore loser all the way to Belarus. Luckily we can all watch a video of Uki's playing from this very site and see and hear for ourselves that this is far from the truth.

You have obviously great contempt for things like "creative individuality" in piano playing and laugh at musicians who spend a lot of time with works of Mozart and Debussy. In your opinion they should spend these hours to make passages in the Liszt sonata faster and more even than they were the day before. You believe that concentration on speed and evenness some day magically turns into interesting music making. I can tell you a secret: practicing speed and force creates speed and force - nothing else. Might be that you are already starting to notice this yourself, being one of the more experienced competitors here.

I have been under the impression that the people who go to classical concerts are looking for different things than spectators of boxing fights. But you have found the future of piano playing by bringing these two sports together. Maybe it would be a good idea to spar together with boxers for inspiration and ideas how to play even louder and faster.

To bring up a suicide of a young pianist in this context as you did shows such undescribably horrible taste that suddendly all the things before start to fall into context. I get the feeling you are kind of implying that Rollero and Sultanov died because people don't appreciate a fast scale and a loud octave passage as they used to. If this was humor it was too dark for me to understand.

Obviously you have no interest for other things than virtuoso repertoire and see piano playing as a sport among others. This is fine, we all have our preferences. Someone else might go to a boxing match to see fine nuances of blood colour.

But calling fellow competitors amateurs and the suicide topics - those you'd better keep to yourself.

Nice to listen all that comments. I think, everybody is quite right.
Uki plays interesting, but 1 hour is realy hard to listen such
a pppppp... If you are not music professional, you can't even hear
all melody. It was in permanto.
So, this piano is already not sound, but interpretation of sound.
In some peaces it can convince this kind of playing, but after 2 rounds you realize - it's artificial:( , like learned.
I can understand Yuris dissappointment. But in competition is always like that- somebody wins, somebody looses.
Best withes for all.
I liked this site, videoblogs and everything...
Sikke

Unfortunately I didn't hear Uki's performances (yet) in this competition but I well remember him play all the Chopin's opus 10 etudes already some ten years ago, effortlessly with solid technique. I call myself pro but can't play even the first two...
Maybe he has forgotten everything during these years but the first prize in this year's Premio Jaen tells something else. Or maybe Jaen is for amateurs only :-)
And, Uki is a very nice guy indeed, a thing that may not matter so much in a piano competition but does matter quite a deal in the REAL world of professional music-making.

I don't want to discuss this matter any further, but I want to thank you for your very interesting and claryfying thougths you shared with us!

I think such things should be a part of the study programmes in every musical education, where they instead tend to practise only technique and play certain music the way the teachers want to hear it. If you know what professors and teachers look for, and usually take up in their classes and master classes, you can get good results in compettions.

if you are a virtuoso, they probably can't play the pieces you choose themselves, and are note interested to give a rightful opionion. A jury should probably consist of other persons than just professors and teachers to get it all right for the competitiors. A performance that appeals to the teachers, is often boring to the audience if the performer has not a strong carisma.

Viva the virtuosos, they can play other things too!

Horowitz would probably never have been accepted to this competition at all!

Music lover

Yuri, you re a pianist for competitions, a " sportive kind"
Uki is from the race of musicians, he loves music like an amateur, yes, but he doesn t care the appearence I guess (nice shirt)....
He doesn t have a nice suit like Marko Mustonen...
He doen t look so sure of him
BUT when he is at the piano he hold everyone s breathe with the most beautiful sound and control of dynamics, a transparency in playing (Sibelius and Debussy like no one plays these days...), a real LEGATO (who still play legato in this competition? Everybody s smashing the piano, playing martellato all the time)
Ok, his Brahms was a litlle down...But still so well thought (the 5th piece ....)
But reading your critics I almost wanted to cry for you...
You re the one that didn t understand that music doesn t happen in competition.... SO continue this way and you will become a well known jury member judging piano like ice skating...

No guys, this is really me.

I need to explain; it will take time, so please be patient.

I was in charge with the Van Cliburn Competition for Talented Amateurs (2004, Fort Worth). It was a very interesting experience to listen stage performances of nearly fifty people of different age - up to 70 y.o.! - and occupations (doctors, engineers, lawyers, college teachers - not music- etc). Of course, many used to study music in their far youth, of course, everyone took several or more private lessons before the competition, of course they spent hours and hours at the piano preparing thoroughly, memorizing works, trying to accommodate their fingers and hands to difficulties of piano technique. Of course, none of them dreamed about public glory or any performing career, the money prizes were very modest (especially for US income), and most of contestants travelled thousand miles at their own expenses - only for love to music.
Of course, like in any other competition, there were winners and losers, successes and failures, weak and strong candidates. But the overall level happened to be such that - I'm going to say a bitter but true thing - Uki Ovaskainen would hardly get any prize should he appear there.

Why I am telling this? – To show that the term “amateur” refers not to a status of a person (e.g. “professional” is who earns money doing something, “amateur” - who does it just for pleasure) but to an actual level of skills.

Referring to the art of piano performance, the term “professionalism” roughly consists of:
1) technical freedom
2) good sound quality and control
3) musical and artistic maturity (including sense of form and style)

Unfortunately, lately it has become possible to neglect any point of these three (or all together) and substitute it with so called “own style” or “creative individuality”.
The genuine individuality of performer comes with freedom, experience and highly developed skills. All others are just masks to hide one or another professional flaw from the eyes (and ears) of audience.

Can you imagine, for instance, a figure skater, who can skate only in very gentle speed and struggles with every jump, but proclaims that this is his own unique style of figure skating? He will be mocked by spectators and thrown out of competition by judges!

Can you imagine a boxer, who has not enough strength in his arms, whose footwork is shaky and whose reaction is retarded, but he pretends that such is his "sportive individuality"? He will be knocked out in the first 10 seconds of fight to the bottom of his "individuality" by any not so individual but simply professional boxer!

Then why (I am saying in general) there are so many pianists – finalists, winners of renowned competitions among of them - whose technique is unstable and tense, whose sound is not projected and always blurry and whose melodic line is not even?

Does piano music deserve to be less professional than any sport? Than any other field of human activity that requires special skills – dance, medicine, engineering, etc.?

Why the realities of contemporary piano world are such that two geniuses - Alexei Sultanov and Corrado Rollero - died in young age, being practically killed - one blamed for his "too" fast speed and "too" powerful sound and the other - for his "too" spontaneous and sincere expression that - alas - does not match demands of concert market nowadays?

One of greatest pianists of our time, Mikhail Pletnev, said with a sort of despair in his recent interview that it has been a very strange division lately: if you can play complicated and virtuoso work (e.g. Liszt Sonata) then you belong just to “pianists”, no matter how deep is your rendition, how interesting is the sound; on the other hand, to belong to “musicians”, you have to spend years on single phrase from Mozart Sonata or Debussy Prelude to discover something “new” in it, again no matter if you cannot play C major scale fast and evenly.
This is very sad and leads to thoughts about future collapse of piano art as such.

Returning to this very competition, just to compare - I have heard four other semifinalists - Mazo, both Mustonnens and Rhee. I have very different opinion about their performances and the things I liked (disliked) in them, but all four displayed PROFESSIONAL pianistic skills that make very clear WHY all these people are in the semifinal of a major international competition.
Unfortunately, I could not find these things in performance of Uki Ovaskainen.

Believe me, I have nothing personal against Uki - I am sure, he is a very nice person, he loves music and works hard at piano. But, as someone said long time ago "to be a nice man is not yet a profession."
Saying "his performance was fine", means to me to betray piano. And all really fine pianists of the world and history.

I am NOT going to continue the discussion on this page; if someone would like to argue we can transfer it to another place.

with best wishes to everyone,
Yuri

It is hard to believe that this amateur... comment is really by Yuri... If this is the case, my dear colleague you're not just way out of line [your personal opinions on colleagues should be, well, the word says it, personal and not public], but you also remind everybody the root of many problems in this profession: musicians themselves and envy among them...

I suspect though, that it is not really you who wrote this, but rather someone who wants to provoke things -for reasons unimaginable to a normal human being... not me. ;-)

Congrats Uki and well done!

Stefanos Nasos, DMus

But I think it is not very professional to say such things you say. Maybe you are just a little jealous?

I know - it is not a perfectly fine thing to comment other contestants, but this is the case I cannot keep silence as it touches the core of our profession.
It was a very surprizing performance by Uki Ovaskainen in the semis just a couple hours ago. His way of playing piano is absolutely - and, I'm afraid, incurably - amateur (that became especially obvious by comparison to the next contestant, professional and well-prepared Yoon-Soo Rhee.)
The fact of his advance to the semifinal is abusive to a good dozen of first round contestants who deserved to take his spot and, furthermore, it is a direct discreditation of the competition of this level.

Yuri Blinov

Just imagined how the press-release of 2012 Maj Lind International Piano Competition would sound:

"by the deadline the competition committee received 22 applications - surprizingly all of them are from the Sibelius Academy."
Bravi!