by Mike Telin
“This summer is going to be a full-immersion experience for our audiences,” Pierre van der Westhuizen (left), President and CEO of the Cleveland International Piano Competition, exclaimed during a recent telephone conversation. “They can attend something in the morning, afternoon, and evening, with lunch and dinner in between.”
When the 2016 Cleveland International Piano Competition and Festival gets underway on July 24 at the Cleveland Museum of Art, patrons will discover that CIPC is a true destination event. [Read more…]
After playing two rounds with no eliminations, the original pool of 24 young pianists in the Cleveland International Piano Competition’s Young Artists Competition was trimmed to 12. The semifinal round pared that number down to six finalists — three each in the Senior and Junior divisions. The final round with Gerhardt Zimmermann and the Canton Symphony Orchestra, played in front of a sold-out house in Gartner Auditorium at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Thursday evening, May 21, would determine who would win first, second and third prizes in each division, as well as who would be awarded the Mozart, Bach and Audience prizes. 
Following Tuesday’s semifinal round, CIPC executive director Pierre van der Westhuizen announced the names of three pianists in the Senior Division who would advance to the final round: Jiachen Xiong (18, China), Yuafan Yang (18, U.K.), and Chaeyoung Park (17, South Korea).
The six Senior Division semifinalists in the Cleveland International Piano Competition’s Young Artist Competition filled Gamble Auditorium at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory with thousands of well-played notes on Tuesday afternoon and evening, May 19 — and undoubtedly presented difficult choices for the jury. That panel of judges would trim the field down to three Senior Division finalists for the final round with the Canton Symphony Orchestra at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Thursday (the three Junior Division finalists were named on Monday evening). 
