SIGHTSEEING IN FORT WORTH Part 1: The Art Museums

SIGHTSEEING IN FORT WORTH, TEXAS

Part I: The Art Museums

I had only one day to pack in all the sightseeing in Fort Worth, just before the start of the Preliminary Rounds of the 14^th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. Having arrived mid-morning at DFW Airport, I was whisked off to Fort Worth’s Worthington Renaissance Hotel thanks to the competition’s hospitality motor-pool. With barely any time to rest (thankfully no jet lag via Seoul’s Incheon), I headed west to the city’s three major art museums. I visited them in this sequence: the Modern Art Museum, the Kimbell Art Museum and the Amon Carter Museum of American Art.

All three are within walking distance of each other, flanking either side of the appropriately named Van Cliburn Way. Entrance to the Modern was USD 10, while the other two were free of charge. I had a very hearty lunch at the Kimbell, and this was a good way to spend the afternoon.

Exterior of the Modern Art Museum.
Richard Serra's Vortex guards the driveway.

The grand staircase leading to
a self-portrait of Andy Warhol.

The Etruscan by
Michelangelo Pistoletto.

Twenty-Five Coloured Marilyns by Andy Warhol.
On the right, what Brigitte Bardot looked like when she was young!

Two works by Anselm Kiefer,
Aschenblume and Book with Wings.

The exterior of the Kimbell, with the sculpture
Woman Addressing the Public by Joan Miro.

The inner garden of the Kimbell is dominated
by Aristide Maillol's L'Air.

The spacious interior of the Kimbell
with its priceless collection of old masters.

The Raising of Lazarus by Duccio di Buoninsegna.

A Munch and a Monet, Girls by a Bridge
and Weeping Willow.

Louis le Nain's Peasant Interior with Old Flute Player.
I do like paintings with cats.

Exterior of the Amon Carter Museum.

Chef d'orchestre.

Frederic Remington's A Dash for the Timber.

Scenes of American life.

More Remingtons.

SIGHTSEEING IN FORT WORTH Part 2: The Stockyards

SIGHTSEEING IN FORT WORTH, TEXAS

Part II: The Stockyards

A trip to “Cowtown” is incomplete without a visit to Fort Worth’s historic Stockyards District. This is located north of the city and is easily navigable by public transport. Away from the city’s skyscrapers, it was a walk down history, notably the Wild West that we commonly associate in those cowboy movies. There was a “Main Street”, with its obligatory saloons, hotel, a coliseum (for cattle auctions), corrals and a disused railway line eerily reminiscent of Auschwitz. 

But there were no heads of cattle to be seen, just a handful of tourists (mostly centred around the watering holes), and lots of empty shops. I bought an obligatory cowboy hat (to complement my cowboy hat from Thailand), had dinner in H3 Ranch, and wolfed down what was possibly the biggest and juiciest steak I ever laid my eyes on.

The lazy drag that leads down to the Stockyards.

Trying to look like a Texan.
The only problem was no one else was wearing cowboy hats!

Now you know you are in Texas.

Cowtown Coliseum.

The Livestock Exchange.

The place where Texan longhorns are viewed,
except that none of them were spotted.
On the right is the rotary for the train engine,
it turns 180 degrees to make a return journey.

A railway line that runs through the Exchange.

A one way journey for most cattle.

The best part of my Stockyards tour:
the best steak meal I have ever had,
at H3 Ranch Grill and Restaurant!

Finalists of the 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition named

The names of the 30 finalists selected for the 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition (2013) have been announced. This is ironically the first competition in which the great American pianist Van Cliburn (above), after whom the competition is named, will not be in attendance. Van Cliburn passed away on 27 February 2013, after succumbing to liver and bone cancer.

They are as follows (in alphabetical order):

Luca Burrato (Italy)

Sean Chen (USA)

Alexei Chernov (Russia)

Sara Daneshpour (USA)

Alessandro Deljavan (Italy)

Fei Fei Dong (China)

Francois Dumont (France)

Yury Favorin (Russia)

Lindsay Garritson (USA)

Jayson Gillham (Australia)

Giuseppe Greco (Italy)

Ruoyu Huang (China)

Claire Huangci (USA)

Vadym Kholodenko (Ukraine)

Nikolay Khozyainov (Russia)

Marcin Koziak (Poland)

Kuan-Ting Lin (Taiwan)

Steven Lin (USA)

Alex McDonald (USA)

Gustavo Miranda-Bernales (Chile)

Nikita Mndoyants (Russia)

Oleksiy Poliykov (Ukraine)

Beatrice Rana (Italy)

Tomoki Sakata (Japan)

Scipione Sangiovanni (Italy)

Hyung-Min Suh (Korea)

Alessandro Taverna (Italy)

Jie Yuan (China)

YouYou Zhang (USA)

Eric Zuber (USA)

The competition takes place from 24 May to 9 June 2013 at the Bass Performance Hall in Forth Worth, Texas. 

Some observations looking ahead to the 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition 2013

The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition is probably the most prestigious and most watched piano concours on the planet. All its rounds are keenly awaited, and watched by thousands on site as well as on the Internet. It is also the most talked about and most keenly debated. The names of the 30 competitors of this year's competition and their repertoire have been released, and here are some of my observations on this year's competition to come.

Increased Prize Money

The major difference in this year’s competition is the prize money. This year’s 1^st prize winner stands to win USD 50,000, up from USD 20,000 at the last competition. This increase matches the top prize offered in the rival Cleveland International Piano Competition (also held this year), but has some way to go in topping the 100,000 Canadian dollars at the Hohens Competition in Calgary, Canada. The possibility of a shared First prize (like in the 2009 competition with Nobuyuki Tsujii and Zhang Haochen) is unlikely to happen this time.

  

Two bites of the cherry

The other change will give the competitors some relief. The final round recital has been removed. Instead, there will be two recitals at the Preliminary stage, giving pianists two opportunities to prove themselves before the first elimination takes place. This is a much fairer system, as pianists who start slower are given a second chance to parade their wares.

Where do the pianists come from?

There is a very strong field of 8 American pianists, so is this the year for an American pianist to win the top prize? For the record, the last American pianist to have won the coveted Gold Medal was Jon Nakamatsu in 1997, and there have been no American finalists since then. Interestingly, five of the eight Americans are of Asian ethnicity.

Italian pianists have generally done well in this competition, and there are six Italians vying for the honours, more than any other nation except the USA. Surprisingly, there are only three competitors from China, and one each from Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. This may have been due to the venue change from Shanghai to Hong Kong for the preliminary auditions. In 2009, there were 18 pianists heard in Shanghai, while this year’s audition in Hong Kong only attracted 6 pianists. So the possibility of having three Asian pianists among the medallists looks less likely this time around.

The Slavic states (Russia, Ukraine and Poland) account for 7 pianists, many of whom have won top prizes in international competitions. Nikolay Khozyainov and Alexei Chernov already appear like potential winners. True to form, there are absolutely no British among the finalists. Only one pianist has previously taken part in the finals of this competition, and that is Alessandro Deljavan (Italy) who was a semi-finalist in 2009. Nikita Mndoyants (Russia) is the son of Alexander Mndoyants, who was awarded a joint 5^th prize in the 1977 competition.

The Juilliard connection

Conspiracy theorists will point out that out of the 17 non-Italian and non-Slavic pianists, no less than 11 have studied or are studying in the Juilliard School of Music. Of these 11, seven are or were students of Veda Kaplinsky (top left), one of the judges who presided upon the preliminary auditions. The list of jurors for the finals in May-June also reveals her name among the 13 people who will who decide who wins this competition. In the 2005 competition, she had excused herself from the jury, and despite that received death threats. Her student Joyce Yang won the Silver medal at that competition. One wonders whether she going to excuse herself from the competition this year.

Repertoire

Looking at the repertoire offered in this competition, there are several standouts from the typical virtuoso-fodder fare. Alex McDonald (USA) is offering the entire Bach Goldberg Variations in his first recital. Vadym Kholodenko (Ukraine) will play only big works in his programmes, Rachmaninov’s First Sonata and Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata in the first two recitals, and all 12 of Liszt’s Transcendental Studies in the semi-final. Yury Favorin (Russia) has the most atypical repertoire of all, playing four of Liszt’s Harmonies Poetiques et Religieuses in his second recital, and rarities of Liszt and Messiaen, and transcriptions of Mussorgsky and Johann Strauss in the semi-finals. The competition set-piece is Birichino by Christopher Theofanidis (left).