Cliburn adds a new contestant
mainNikita Abrosimov, 28, of Russia, was added today to the contestants in the Fifteenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, May 25–June 10, 2017, at Fort Worth’s Bass Performance Hall.
He replaces Mehdi Ghazi of Algeria and Canada, who has withdrawn from the competition. No reason given.
This is a repeat of what happened to him at the 2013 Cliburn Competition:
Meet the Pianists: Nikita Abrosimov
Next in our look at the 30 competitors in the 2013 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition: The Russian was a last-minute replacement in the contest, a situation not new to him.
by Jan Farrington
published Monday, May 20, 2013
It’s happened to him before: a wonderful opportunity—but dropping into his lap at the last possible minute.
Russian pianist Nikita Abrosimov, 24, is the second Cliburn contender (the other was South Korea’s Yekwon Sunwoo) who received a surprise phone call in early May telling him that two of the 30 chosen pianists had dropped out of the competition. Abrosimov would be coming to Fort Worth after all.
“….For the competition to include in that list anything other than standard repertoire works should be foolish and irrelevant… ”
Quote from Peter Donahoe in an recent thread concerning what was performed at the latest Rubinstein competition.
The works chosen by the 30 competitors of the 2017 Cliburn competition can be viewed at cliburn.org and absolutely confirm this dogma.
Good listening and viewing for everyone intensely interested in still more performances of Tchaikovsky’s 1st and Rachmaninov’s 3rd piano concerto and the other similar gems of the rare and neglected repertoire.