Riding in a pink Cadillac: Cliburn pianists get taste of Texas

May 24,2017

By Andrea Hines

Taking a deep breath before the 15th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition begins, 30 young pianists posed Wednesday inside a pink Cadillac parked in front of Bass Hall in downtown Fort Worth, wearing brand-new cowboy hats and grinning at the American finery.

Ilya Shmukler, 22, is visiting the U.S. for the first time. His host family, Brad and Marilyn Brewster, snapped plenty of photos of him behind the wheel of the Caddy.

“It is something new for me,” Shmukler said. “You don’t have this in Russia … all the cowboy hats and the pictures.”

The first round of the Cliburn competition begins at 2:30 p.m. Thursday with a recital by Polish pianist Julia Kociuban, 25.

She said she really wanted to practice instead of spending the morning posing for a group photo in Sundance Square and getting a free cowboy hat from Overland. Hers was the last name drawn at the opening dinner Tuesday night.

“To be honest, right now I would prefer to spend the whole day next to the piano and just practice and just feel my program again and feel the energy,” Kociuban said.

The competitors will each play a 45-minute recital that will include a commissioned work by juror Marc-Andre Hamelin. Twenty competitors will be chosen Sunday to advance to the quarterfinal round.

American pianist Sun-A Park, 29, had her name drawn first at the draw party Tuesday evening and chose to play at 4:25 p.m. Saturday.

The draw party at the Worthington Renaissance Fort Worth Hotel on Tuesday night, was decorated with massive rose centerpieces in brilliant oranges and pinks, and featured a three-course dinner for the competitors, their host families and Cliburn donors.

“I’ve never been to such a lavish draw party before,” Park said. “I could really tell this was one of the best competitions.”

British pianist Martin James Bartlett, 20, said the Cliburn is his first international piano competition and “so far it’s been thrilling.”

He plans to practice before his recital, but Bartlett is not just about work.

“I’m going to be sampling all of the local delights,” he said. “I’ve already been to some really cool places to eat food, but of course, I’m going to be doing a lot of preparation as well.”