Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Van Cliburn "Amateur" Competition 2016

Coaster was scheduled to begin at 12:57 (Central/Ft Worth time) today; SiFi at 3:48.

Sifi is Simon Finlow. Gorden Cheng used to post here often, but hasn't lately. I forgot his PW handle. He just finished a few minutes ago. You can probably figure out which one Coaster was.

I’ve been checking in on YouTube to catch performances by Forum members/ Coaster turned in an excellent WTC performance. The voicing in the fugue was first-rate. Her interpretation of the Debussy Arabesque was lovely. The phrasing, voicing, tone and (especially) pedaling were all admirable, and her long lines and graceful phrasing let the music flow freely.

Gordon Cheng’s performance of the Abegg Variations was world class. After listening to it, I played a live Richter recording of the piece for comparison. Richter had the power, but on the whole I thought Gordon’s performance was better. It was more musically satisfying, subtle yet scintillating. The Brahms Hungarian Dance arrangement (his own?) seemed less successful. But purely on the strength of his Schumann, I think he’ll be a very strong contender for the podium.

Time to go mow the lawn.

Very nice Arabesque and you can already listen to it again along with the others in that first group of contestants



That was the Brahms arrangement.

Wonderful playing Simon !!!

Congrats coaster. I'm going to listen to your performance later. What a FABLULOUS piano!

Hey guys, it's me, Gorden.

It's been a while but it's great to be back in the competition hot seat!

Oh, now I remember, Gorden is Fuzzy8balls.

So besides SiFi, Coaster, and Fuzzy8balls, what other PW members are participating in the competition?

doctor S (David Swenson)

Saffet Bayka is the brother of a PW member, I believe.

Haven't been able to hear as many as I'd have liked to hear, but.....

Everyone I've heard is good. In fact, I'd say real good.

In such a field, the decisions of course are very tough. Who do you leave out?? Even with more people than usual making the next round (almost half), it will be very, very hard to be leaving some people out.

BTW, while I'm very sad about not being among them, I'm also relieved about not being among them.
On my best day I don't play as well as most of these people are playing.

Pretty low number of comments here considering 30 people have performed already!

We're pacing ourselves.

BTW I'm talking with friends more than I'm posting.

Congratulations all on your performances Have a good time!

You can say that again. I've only heard 4 that I think are doomed in this round, so far.

David's playing at 4:51 tomorrow afternoon. He's doing my favorite Chopin Scherzo, #3, so tune in!

BTW, I'm not wanting to single out any people too much on here, but I'll just say that I think Piano World is batting 1.000 so far on our members making the next round.

Yes - and he's posted here a few times as well. We'll cheer Saffet on too !!!

Best of luck to those competing! Fun to have the real names now so that I could read your bios and know who to root for. I am hoping my son and I can make it over to Ft. Worth this week to watch some portion of the competition live.