The Chopin Competition is being watched by millions

The Chopin Competition is being watched by millions

News

norman lebrecht

October 15, 2021

We’ve received first official audience figures from the Competition, which reaches its climax next week.

On Youtube, the average number of views per day over the oast two weeks has been 616,000

Total number of views during tage 2 was 4,677,910

Total viewing time so far: 1 400 000 hours. At one point, Youtube was receiving 1,300 comments a minute.

The Competition is also being shown on Polish Television TVP and, in China, on weibo.

Many are choosing to view directly on the Competition’s own site.

 

Comments

  • debuschubertussy says:

    You’d think other competitions would follow suit, but nope, as far as I can tell, the Chopin is the only major piano competition to broadcase all its videos live and free, no subscription required…the Rubinstein made you subscribe or some of kind sign-up process to view anything. No thank you!

    (on a side note, is that possibly why Chopin competition winners in recent years have tended to have better careers than the winners of other competitions?)

  • Frank Flambeau says:

    Chopin was a wonderful composer and these competitions are good. No surprise.

  • Jeffrey Biegel says:

    Chopin is in good hands, musically and technologically. Such a wonderful platform for all of these young musicians to celebrate and share this incredible music.

  • john humphreys says:

    At the age of 76 this competition has provided me with some of the greatest pianism I’ve ever heard. Astounding. The level of technical address and imagination of these young players beggars belief. The ability to choose which make of piano to play a mistake though. Not a level playing field.

    • debuschubertussy says:

      Why is that a mistake? Pianists get to choose what piano they play on in real life. We dont make professional tennis players use the same racquet brand.

    • fsm says:

      As debuschubertussy pusses it so succinctly, they should have the right to choose and its looking like the Steinway is chosen by more competitors anyway and I must say it sounds overall to me, the best. So its informative for listeners to compare brands as well, glad they allow the choice of piano.

  • christopher storey says:

    It’s a great festival of music, and one of the surprising things is that some of the competitors are choosing to play lesser known repertoire such as the Mazurkas ( which in so many ways are the heart of Chopin) , the Trois Nouvelles Etudes, the B Flat Polonaise op 71 No 2 etc

    • Sue Sonata Form says:

      It has been wonderful but I’m surprised Martin Garcia Garcia made it to the finals. His histrionics and gyrations have proven impossible to watch.

  • hayato_fan says:

    I bet most of the views are from Asia.

  • Geoff Cox says:

    The standard of playing is extremely high. Wonderful !

  • Plush says:

    Fabulous picture and sound on YouTube. Each competitor is stellar.

  • Ehub says:

    If you can’t watch, it’s also being broadcast by Dwojke radio Polskie. They also carried all the auditions earlier in the week.

  • Fsm says:

    Its been revelatory and rewarding experience to watch and no trouble finding complete broadcasts of all performances and results as your favorites progress, and it’s hard to pick a favorite, they’re all good, I like Furumi

  • Tweettweet says:

    I absolutely love the broadcasts by the Chopin Piano Competition. It adds to the fame of the competition and it creates a bigger community.

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