sideNotes:
What does it take for a pianist to be successful? “They should be discovered early, and that’s the most important thing”, says Gary Graffman, one of America’s most respected pianists and teachers. “People who have no background at home in music, suddenly hear Beethoven at the age of 16 and decide to learn the piano – sure, they can learn something, but it’s too late. A doctor could explain it better, but like a tennis player or a swimmer, musicians have to develop their talent early. Next, you need a teacher, a good teacher. It doesn’t necessarily have to be someone famous, as each case is different. And lastly, you need parental support, but not too much (that’s one of the problems in Asia, where parents make their kids practise ten hours a day). There is definitely a risk of doing too much too soon: too many concerts and competitions. Personally, I am totally against competitions, with some exceptions. I didn’t allow Lang Lang to enter competitions. He would scream and cry and carry on, so I’d let him go to one, but basically, he followed my advice. Same with Yuja Wang. Why? Well, they simply didn’t need to play competitions.”
Actually, Yuja Wang did win at a competition (Third Prize at the 2001 Sendai International Piano Competition), but that was when she was 14 and hadn’t even made it to Curtis yet. What Graffman admits, however, is that competitions bring concerts, opportunities and exposure – the whole package, whether you win a prize or not. Exposure is often key: back in the day, competitions were limited to live audiences, constrained by venue size.
Today, a competition’s global audience can easily reach tens of millions (the 2025 Cliburn International Piano Competition drew over 60 million views across 177 countries) and therefore can have a significant impact on a young artist’s career.
At the same time, bigger audiences don’t make the jury’s job any easier. Take the 2024 Leeds International Piano Competition, for example, where the judges’ decision not to advance 24-year-old Tomoharu Ushida to the finals created an uproar. His livestream audience celebrated him anyway, voted en masse, and handed him the medici.tv Audience Award, even though he wasn’t present in the final round.
Arie Vardi, Chair of the Jury at the Arthur Rubinstein Competition, puts it best: “A jury may decide one way or the other, but there is always the public. And so you can win a competition without actually winning it.” Vardi proved right again this June at the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels. Chinese pianist Jiaxin Min, an audience favourite from the start, was not among the six main prize winners of the competition and only received the distinction of a “Laureate”. The audience was visibly and audibly upset, but it didn’t have to be – Min not only received standing ovations but also walked away with invitations from major concert promoters, including the BOZAR in Brussels, where she is performing not once, but twice this year.
What does it take for a pianist to be successful? Only time will tell.
Florian Riem
