The Well-Tempered Ear

Meet the medal winners of the 2023 Tchaikovsky Competition

PS: Note that in the last blog post, originally The Ear mistakenly said the first session of the  First Unitarian Society summer sings for the public is on Tuesday, July 10. The correct day is MONDAY, JULY 10. The Ear apologizes for the error and any inconvenience.

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By Jacob Stockinger

The 17th international Tchaikovsky Competition (*the official logo is below) was held in Moscow and St. Petersburg from June 19 to July 1, 2023.

As usual, Russian contestants completely dominated the various categories and various medal levels. No surprise there.

Contestants from the United Kingdom, the United States and France also took home medals.

But Asian musicians continued to demonstrate their competition-winning talents. Many came from China — but not from Taiwan, Japan, Taiwan and North Korea. Quite noticeable, however, were the many contestants and medal winners from non-communist South Korea.

You might recall that South Korean contestants also won the Van Cliburn Competition last year and the Cliburn Junior and Chopin competitions earlier this year.

Clearly, South Korea is doing something special that works when it comes to music education. Indeed, music education is Asia seems especially successful, as was discussed in a previous blog post: 

For specific names of category winners with their placement and nationality, here are links:

PIANO: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/595.htm

VIOLIN: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/598.htm

CELLO: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/599.htm

VOICE: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/603.htm

BRASS: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/597.htm

WOODWINDS: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/602.htm

And the official website for the competition has lots of blogs and vlogs (video blogs); biographies of the contestants; repertoire; details about the competition including four orchestras and conductors (including Valery Gergiev, who supports Vladimir Putin and the Russian war in Ukraine); venues and history; and a photo gallery.

OFFICIAL WEBSITE: https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/

If you would like to hear many recitals and concerts from various rounds of the competition and the Laureate Concerts in Moscow and St. Petersburg, just go to YouTube and type Tchaikovsky Competition 2023 in the search engine.

In honor of Van Cliburn, the 23-year-old American who unexpectedly won the first Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958 during the Cold War and found lifelong international acclaim, is this year’s gold medalist in the piano, Sergei Davydchenko from Russia.

He is playing the second and third movements of Tchaikovsky’s famous and popular Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor, Op. 23.