Nimrod Borenstein Composes For Top Hong Kong Piano Competition

Rising composer Nimrod Borenstein is in demand these days from leading music competitions - this week his Mephisto piano etude will receive its world premiere, 15 times over as it were, from all the semi-finalists at the Hong Kong International Piano Competition. Every day from October 7th to 14th will see two competitors play the new work, which was specially commissioned from Borenstein by the competition.

Borenstein, whose music has received frequent recordings in recent years (by Vladimir Ashkenazy and others), is no stranger to writing for competitions - among those to have commissioned him are the International Jeunesses Musicales Competition (for their forthcoming 50th anniversary), and the Marie Cantagrill International Violin Competition.

"It's an honour and a great experience to compose for great competitions like the Hong Kong International Piano Competition," says Borenstein, "Because, as an artist, how often is it that you get to hear 15 performances - 15 different interpretations of your work by brilliant musicians? At the same time, the competition setting imposes a useful discipline to compose in a way that really explores various technical facilities of the instrument - which is also of course a kind of freedom!"

As ever, Borenstein will be busy on the premieres front in the coming months, including:

November 18th, 2019, Berlin - Kangding Qingge Piano Etude (German premiere), Albert Lau (piano)

November 26th, 2019, London - Water Droplets In Venice for piano solo (World Premiere), Clelia Iruzun (piano)

December 8th, 2019, Nishinomiya City, Japan - Lullaby for violin, alto saxophone and piano (Japan premiere), Saori Haji (piano), Maya Azuma (violin), Miwa Yamada (saxophone)

January 15th, 2020, Florida Tour - Violin Concerto, South Florida Symphony Orchestra, Irmina Trynkos (violin), Sebrina Alfonso (cond.)