As some people on PT may know, I started competing in adult amateur piano competitions last year after a long hiatus and have been really enjoying this newfound community. Later this week, I'm going to my first piano festival, a week at Oberlin which also includes a competition! A lot of my friends went to PianoTexas earlier this year, which has a festival and a concerto movement competition but not a solo competition.
There's a few things I'm really excited about for this festival/competition:
- One of my (many) musical grandfathers Robert Shannon is on the jury! I hope I'll get to take a lesson or masterclass with him.
- Outreach concerts - Classical music offers so much to appreciate, but nowadays it's not very accessible to people. Outreach concerts are a great way to enrich the local community while satisfying our itch to perform.
- Due to low awareness, there's few enough people competing that there will be no eliminations between the preliminary and semifinal rounds. As a competitor, it can be incredibly frustrating to spend so much time preparing a piece and not getting to play it, and also trying to figure out how to strategically program your pieces when you're only guaranteed 10 minutes of playtime. Between this and the festival/outreach concerts, I think people will leave feeling like they had ample opportunity to share their music!
- Dorm life - only half-joking, I honestly think most people would benefit from spending more time in walkable, high-serendipity environments with open-minded peers. I fully expect this week to be Type 2 fun.
If people want to follow along, I'm not sure if there's a livestream, so I'm going to try to set up an unofficial one for anyone who wants to watch!
Saturday, July 26 @ 1:30pm–4:00pm ET: Preliminary Round (10 min)
Sunday, July 27 @ 1:30pm–5:00pm ET: Semifinal Round (15 min)
Monday, July 28 @ 1:30pm–5:00pm ET: Final Round (30 min)
Would people interested in hearing more about the experience? Any questions? Ask away!