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Amazing pianism at the Liszt Competition in Weimar

Competitions

Zhonghua Wei from Xiamen wins the 2024 edition

The winners of the 2024 International Franz Liszt Competition Weimar-Bayreuth are Zhonghua Wei (16, from Xinhai), as well as Chia-Yang Hsu and Viktoria Baskakova.

A total of 64 pianists from around the world had applied for the 11th International Franz Liszt Competition Weimar – Bayreuth. After a preliminary video selection, the best 28 were invited to Bayreuth for the first round of the competition.

The Liszt Competition, organized in cooperation with the city of Bayreuth, is considered one of the most important international competitions focusing on the work of Franz Liszt. The required competition repertoire places a clear focus on Franz Liszt's piano work in the first and second rounds. There will be a new addition to the semi-final in 2024: for the first time, one of four piano quintets by Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, Antonin Dvořák or César Franck must be selected and performed together with the Karol Szymanowski Quartet. The final will then focus once again on the competition's namesake with his two piano concertos.

Zhonghua Wei, 1st prize winner

Zhonghua Wei began his piano studies piano with Jay Sun, his current teacher, when he was 5 years old, gave his solo recital debut at the age of 10, and by the age of 12 had studied the complete Well-Tempered Clavier of Bach, etudes of Chopin and Liszt, and Mozart Sonatas. Currently attending the Xinghai Conservatory Middle School, he has placed in several national Chinese competitions, including Pearl River Kayserburg (first), Steinway (second), and Xinghai Cup (first). And he just won the 2023 Hilton Head International Competition in South Carolina. Of his approach to music, he says: “The music itself drives me to play it. I think it is so interesting and beautiful—carrying life, history, and feelings—and I want to find out these things, to perform what the composers want to say, to integrate my own understanding in it.”

Chia-Yang Hsu, 2nd prize winner

Viktoria Baskakova, 3rd prize winner

Prizes:
1st prize: Zhonghua Wei (16) , Xinghai
2nd prize: Chia-Yang Hsu (25), Hamburg
3rd prize: Viktoria Baskakova (27), Moscow

Jury:
Michail Lifits (Chair), Michel Dalberto, Wolfgang Döberlein, Norma Fisher, Leslie Howard, Mariya Kim, Vivian Li, Boris Petrushansky, Lilya Zilberstein

Artists:
Staatskapelle Weimar/ Johannes Klumpp (Conductor)

 

© WFIMC 2024 / FR