Tips for contestants from the head of the jury

This year the competition brought together 83 pianists from 12 countries. Performances of the young musicians will be evaluated by respectable jury: Valery Kozlov (Ukraine), Stanislav Pochekin (Spain-Russia), Paola Volpe (Italy), Elza Kolodin (Germany), Valida Rassoulova-Suk (USA), and Pascal Gallet (France). Valery Kozlov, chairman of the jury, Professor of Piano Department at Pyotr Tchaikovsky National Music Academy of Ukraine, told The Day about what is the best way to prepare a child for professional music competition, about psychological attitude before performing on stage, and other things.

Mr. Kozlov, in your opinion, how should education of a future pianist begin?

“It seems to me that the music system in Ukraine today and the one that was in the former Soviet Union, and before that in the Russian Empire, is optimal. Its multistage character – children’s music school, music college, conservatory, and graduate studies until now allowed performers to achieve high results. Music School or 10-year school is a very good preparatory stage. However, it is not an easy task to raise a child to be a professional pianist and it requires hard labor of teachers, parents, and the child himself. Mere talent is not enough for this, a child needs to practice for long hours and have strong motivation – desire to play music and interest to music classes. Unfortunately, teachers often discourage young musicians, that’s why we have to develop this interest in all possible ways. At the initial stage classes may be held in a game format because sometimes it is difficult to explain to a child that hard and often monotonous work is often required to achieve a goal. Environment is also important for a child – family and, of course, teacher should support him.”

How does the European system of music education differ from the one in Ukraine?

“In Europe most children’s music schools are private and there are very few public ones. Child receives basic education at school, where they attend music and culture classes held at a very high level. There is no system of music schools familiar to us. While in Ukraine a child studies according to a particular program that requires a child to play on stage at least three or four times a year, in Europe (even in institutes) students rarely perform on stage – only during their entrance exam and after that they might play at about two or three public concerts during the time of their training. I would also like to note that private education is very developed abroad. Of course, there are strong professional schools like Julliard School in New York (it is very expensive to study there), or a school similar to our 10-year schools at the Institute in Hanover, but this is only a fraction of such kind of music schools for a large number of children who wish to receive professional music education.”

Is there a system of musical development for children in secondary schools in Ukraine now?

“We do not have such classes. The so-called music classes involve acquiring skills of choral singing, ear training and that’s it! During the Soviet times children studied musical literature and were involved in concert organization. In order to make a child fully developed we need to teach them humanities, I mean, at least, a summary of painting, architecture, theater… In addition to literature and history, children should study music culture, art history, and history of religion. This is necessary so that a child would come out of school with broad outlook. There is not much of it, especially in modern society.”

How much time should a person spend a day to prepare for the competition and achieve good results?

“Some problems can be solved in a half hour sessions, and yet you can spend a whole day practicing and achieve nothing! It employs the principle of brainstorming: when a person is focused and knows what he wants to do, it allows him to achieve the goal easier. When I was a student myself, we were told that Hryhorii Sokolov practiced for five hours every day and did not miss a single day! Sviatoslav Richter had a notebook where he recorded the duration of his sessions. He had to practice for a certain number of hours and if he did not do it long enough, he put it down as a debt to himself and had to work this debt out later. There are very few people who are able to play well without hours of regular practice. And when we speak about training of a child to participate in such challenging competition as ‘Horowitz-Debut’ (International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz), practicing at this stage are nothing like hard labor needed to prepare for adult international competition [That is repertory requirements and the volume. – Author]. These are two completely different tasks.”

Should young musicians psychologically prepare themselves before performing on stage in order not to get disappointed and not to lose interest in learning in the future? What would be your advice on how they should prepare themselves before playing on stage?

“The child should be told that the competition is not only a chance to win and get the prize, but above all it is an opportunity to show themselves, perform on prestigious stage, play the perfect piano for the public. I think it is important to tell a child that professional musicians would listen to him play and would evaluate his performance. Of course, it is necessary to cultivate strong will in children and help them prepare mentally before going out on the stage. I always tell my students that they need to play the best they can – this is the main task. And then it all depends on the competition.

“When you come out on a stage you should enjoy the communication with music, the instrument, and the audience. If this attitude is cultivated in a person, he will have no fear of performing for big audience. Let everyone have a motto: if you want to perform well, you have to rehearse a lot! You need to give yourself up wholly to what you do and that’s why you need to love the thing you do.”