History of the H.Neuhaus Moscow festivals
The Moscow H. Neuhaus Festivals of Young Pianists were organized by the Department of Culture of Moscow City, the Department of Culture of South-Eastern Administrative District of Moscow, methodical cabinet on art schools and culture and the H.Neuhaus Music School, with support of the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Moscow Philharmonic Society, the Russian Cultural Foundation, MSSMSH Gnesin, Beethoven music school, the International Charitable Fund “New Names”, publishing company “Classic-XXI” and Yamaha company.
Conducted in April 1998 under the patronage of Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov First H. Neuhaus Festival of Young Pianists gathered 118 members from eleven countries and has become a major event in the musical life of our capital. The second festival, held in October 2003 with the support and active assistance of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and Minister of Culture Mikhail Shvydkoi, also was marked by great attention and interest of the educational community and media.
Third qualifying round of the Third H. Neuhaus Moscow Festival of Young Pianists received 119 submissions from Moscow, St. Petersburg and 49 other cities and republics of the Russian Federation, as well as from Bulgaria, Ukraine, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Korea, China and Switzerland.
Members of the international jury for the festivals were H. Neuhaus pupils, famous professors and pianists: V.V.GORNOSTAYEVA (jury chairman), L. Naumov, E.V. Malinin, A.A.Nasedkin, B.L .Kremenshteyn, G.B.Gordon, I.Nikonovich, E. J. Liberman, V. Kastelsky, A. Tarakanov, A.N. Fomina, V. Derevianko (Israel), I. Zetel ( Germany), J. Frema (France), Vladimir Voskoboinikov (Italy), representing the leading tertiary music institutions in Moscow and various Russia cities and abroad.
H.Neuhaus Festival – one of the few creative competitions for young pianists, which combine students of children’s music and art schools, secondary special music schools, high schools, colleges and students of music schools.
The main feature of all H.Neuhaus festivals – a high quality creative result of competitive auditions. For many winners and participants the first success at the festival was the beginning of further learning with professors of H.Neuhaus piano school, a bright artistic destiny and wins at international piano competitions. So, Alexander Kobrin became a winner of F. Lyamonda International Piano Competition (UK, 1998), the F. Busoni (Italy, 1999), the V. Cliburn (USA, 2005) competitions. Olga Kozlova became a winner of the Franz Liszt V International Piano Competition (Germany, 2006), Miroslav Kultyshev have got the silver medal of the P. Tchaikovsky XIII International Competition (first prize not awarded) (Moscow, 2007), Daniel Trifonov became a winner of the P.Tchaikovsky XIV International Competition (Moscow, 2011), the A.Rubinstain Competition (Izrael, 2011), won third prize at the F. Chopin XVI International competition ( Warsaw, 2010). Titles and winners of many prestigious international and national competitions were awarded to: Konstantin Shamray, Andrew Gugnin, Alexander Kudryavtsev, Denis Kuznetsov, Alexey Kudryashov, Paul Dombrowski, Ivan Rudin, Ekaterina Yatsuk, Alexei Chernov (Russia), Stanislav Khristenko (Ukraine), Christian Devine (Netherlands ), Xenia Malyarevich (France), Rem Takagi (Japan) and other winners of the first three H. Neuhaus festivals of Young Pianists .
The main prize for each festival – concert and excursion for all the winners to the cities of different countries. The winners of the festival were in Rome, Venice, Florence and Naples (1999), winners of the second festival gave concerts in Berlin and Vienna (2004). All participants of these concert tours visited the Russian Embassy in Italy (Rome, 1999) and Germany (Berlin, 2004).
Winners of the Third H. Neuhaus Moscow Festival of Young Pianists participated in a concert in a Alfred Cortot concert hall in Paris (2008).
Master classes and concerts were always performed on Moscow H. Neuhaus Festivals of Young Pianists. Jury of leading professors and lecturers, pianists from different countries held lectures, open the lessons of the Second International Forum of teachers-musicians (1998), Third International Forum “Gifted Children. The path to mastery” (2003), educational conferences on music education, “Under the sign of Neuhaus”, concerts, festivals, winner of the first name of H. Neuhaus, as well as evenings in memory of members of the jury of previous contests: E.V. Malinin, A. Naumov, V.V. Kastelsky and E.Lieberman (2008).
Participants in these creative events were: Diane Andersen (Belgium), Marcel Bode and Willem Brons (Netherlands), Victor Rosenbaum (USA), Tigran Alikhanov, Leonid Gakkel, V.Gornostaeva, Andrew Diev, Andrei Zolotov, Tatiana Zelikman, Valery Kastelsky, Bertha Kremenshteyn , Eugene Liberman, Evgeny Malinin Malinin Tatyana-Fedkina, Alexei Nasedkin, Lev Naumov, Naumova, Irina, Igor Nikonovich, Irina Osipova, Elena Richter, Ivan Sokolov, Albert Tarakanov, Vladimir Tropp, Natalia Fomina, Zora Zucker, Kira Shashkin, Yvette Yudovich (Russia), Viktor Derevianko (Israel), Peter Donohoe and Malcolm Troup (UK), Isaac Zetel, Markus Strange and Markus Schwarz (Germany), Marcel Krudeli (Italy), Michal Nedelka and Radek Kvapil (Czech Republic), Rene Salaks (Latvia ), Mariann Abraham (Hungary), Adeline Burashka (Canada), Jan Chape (Ireland) and others.