We have thousands of human-written stories, discussions, interviews and reviews from today through the past 20+ years. Find them here:

January 7, 2006 at 10:02 PM

I'm considering participating in a youth music competition. It has a large prize for the winner. It is in Montgomery, Alabama, so it wouldn't be a really long distance from where I live (Georgia). The name of the competition is the Blount-Slawson Young Artists Competition. I am curious if anyone knows about this competition or has participated in it or knows someone who has?

My main concern is the difficulty of the piece I should play. I would like to play Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 3, since I learned it a few months ago and have used it for auditions before, and have it memorized.

However, I don't want to play Mozart against someone that could be potentially playing a Paganini Concerto (since I don't know the skills of the other competitors)

In that case, I am wondering if I should play Bruch No. 1 or Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole? I learned those concertos nearly a year ago, so I would need to re-learn them.

but, I think that if I play Mozart well, then that would be better than if I played Bruch well.

Mozart is much more difficult musically to play, am I right? Although, technically, the chords/double stops in the third movement of Bruch are difficult to play in-tune.

Also, for the competition, I would only play one movement of a concerto. This one movement does not have to be from memory, so would that make it an easy competition?

My private teacher gave me a pamphlet on this competition and said it might interest me, but he didn't really say much other than that. I think I should probably call him.

If you're choosing between Bruch, Lalo, and Mozart (assuming you can play the first movement of each about equally well), I'd say go with Lalo, because

1. It's flashier
2. You can play the first movement (Bruch just goes right into the second)
3. Mozart is DANGEROUS to play at a competition. The intonation, bowing technique, musicality all has to be spot-on to sound good.

Having said that, I'm playing the first movement of Mozart 5 for my conservatory's concerto competition in a few weeks.

If you feel you can pull off a spotless Mozart, knock their socks off! ;) There is something to be said for that...
Whatever you choose though, have fun... it sounds like your aspirations are in the right place, and competitions are always a great experience and motivator... have fun! =)
I would say to play whatever piece you like the most - it doesn't have to be the most difficult, just the one that you can play the most musically. And perform the best - too bad if it's terribly impressive and you can't perform

From Susanna Turner
Posted on January 8, 2006 at 10:06 AM

it well. Best of Luck!

From Nick Bleisch
Posted on January 8, 2006 at 4:24 PM

I might suggest the Bruch depending on how it sounds. I think the Bruch third movement is really the same problem as Mozart, but the Bruch should be easier for you now that you're coming back to it. Plus, It is Very Dangerous to Compete with any Classical Composer. You never know if the judges think you should be playing off the shoulder! Or then again, maybe they think Mozart should sound like Beethoven.
By the way, the Bruch was lucky for me--I won my concerto competition with the third movement. It is very popular without being too overplayed. Good luck!

This entry has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.