Nearly 60 hours of piano playing and 14 days of waiting came to an end last night, with the announcement of the results of the Axa Dublin International Piano Competition.
The roar of approval after Alexei Nabioulin's iridescent performance of Prokofiev's Third Concerto on Wednesday was a clear declaration of where the audience's allegiance lay. The jury duly obliged, and it fell to the President, Mrs McAleese, to present him with the first prize. Along with his cheque for £10,000, the 21-year-old Russian will receive a string of engagements and a Kawai grand piano - by curious coincidence, he was the only finalist who chose to play on a Kawai rather than a Steinway.
Judging by the applause at both finals and semi-finals, the audience's next choice would probably have been another Russian, Kirill Gerstein (20). The jury, however, awarded him the £5,000 third prize, and gave the £7,500 second prize to the youngest competitor in the final, Taiwanese Chiao-Ying Chang (19). She also scooped the Axa Prize (£1,000 plus a recital at the NCH, awarded for the best semi-final recital by a finalist other than the winner), and the NSO Prize of a concerto performance with the National Symphony Orchestra (awarded for the best concerto performance by a finalist other than the winner).
The fourth, fifth and sixth prizes, valued at £4,000, £3,000 and £2,000 respectively, went to 22-year-old Canadian David Jalbert, 20-year-old German Evgeny Sudbin, and 23-year-old Yugoslavian Lidija Bizjak.
Special prizes for the best performances of pieces by specified composers went to Nabioulin (for his playing of a Field nocturne), Gerstein (for Bach and Mozart), and 24-year-old Israeli, Katya Apekisheva (for Schubert).
The prize for the best performance of one of the specially commissioned test pieces went to Bizjak, who played Seoirse Bodley's Chiaroscuro (The Taking of Christ), and the suite of prizes for the best-placed Irish competitor went to Maria McGarry from Ballyhaunis, Co Mayo.
