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First Stage - Day 1: Ms. Julie Haismann of France began with Scarlatti’s Sonata in B-flat major, K. 545, which featured skilled and tasteful use of finger legato. This was followed by her performance of Paderewski’s Sonata in E-flat minor, Op. 21, bringing the first day of Stage I to a stunning close. The entire opus demonstrated an admirable sense of continuity and large-scale musical processes, highlighting motivic relationships both within and between the movements. Throug

On Monday, November 24th, the Laureates performed a final concert in the hall of the National Philharmonic in Warsaw. The first half of the evening began with the highest-ranked Polish pianist, Mr. Michał Oleszak, who started with a performance of the competition commission, Herdzin’s Arrectis auribus, from his second stage program, notable for it’s well-voiced octaves. This was followed by a performance of “Shéhérazade” from Szymanowski’s Op. 34 Masques, which—as during the

Photo by Aria Anderson © 2026 On Saturday, April 18th, students of the Peabody Preparatory school in Baltimore, Maryland had the opportunity to work with concert pianist and pedagogue Jarred Dunn during a masterclass, which was followed by a performance and Q&A session. While this was undoubtedly an invaluable experience for the students with whom Dunn worked directly, the benefits of the event extended equally to the audience members, who were treated to a demonstration of D

On the evening of Thursday, December 4 th , I had the pleasure of attending a sold-out performance at the concert hall of the National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice. Although this wonderful orchestra, under the exceptional direction of Marin Alsop, began the evening with a lovely rendition of Iryna Aleksiychuk’s Go Where the Wind Takes You and concluded with a monumental presentation of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, it was pianist Olga Kern’s stunning performance