ASIANS OUT of 2010 Chopin International Piano Competition

The names of the finalists for the 2010 Chopin International Piano Competition have been announced. For the first time since 1975 (the edition won by Krystian Zimerman), there will be NO Asian pianists in the finals of the Chopin International Piano Competition.

The ten finalists are (in alphabetical order):

1. Yulianna Avdeeva (Russia)
2. Evgeni Bozhanov (Bulgaria)
3. François Dumont (France)
4. Lukas Geniušas (Russia/Lithuania)
5. Nikolay Khozyainov (Russia)
6. Miroslav Kultyshev (Russia)
7. Daniil Trifonov (Russia)
8. Hélene Tysman (France)
9. Paweł Wakarecy (Poland)
10. Ingolf Wunder (Austria)

There will be 8 performances of Chopin's First Piano Concerto and two performances of the Second Piano Concerto.

The four Asian semifinalists who did not make the final cut were Dong Fei Fei (China), Claire Huangci (USA), Rachel Cheung (Hong Kong) and Sun Mei Ting (USA), from L to R respectively. This is in marked contrast with the fortunes of Asian pianists in the 2005 competition, who took 5 out of 6 finals places. By the way, there were three Asian pianists in the competition jury: Fou Ts'ong (China), Dang Thai Son (Vietnam) and Michie Koyama (Japan). There is only one Russian (Bella Davidovich) and five Poles in the jury. So there is unlikely to be any speculation of anti-Asian bias for this competition.