International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs

The International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs (French: Concours des Grands Amateurs de Piano) is a piano competition for amateur pianists, held in Paris, France. It has been held annually since 1989. The competition is widely considered to be one of the top-level competitions for amateur musicians in the world.^[1] ^[2]

Concept

Created in 1989 by Gérard Bekerman, professor of economics at the university and a graduate of the Paris School of Music, the International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs is designed for top-level amateurs. They come from all walks of life – doctors, office workers, lawyers, students, pensioners, engineers, and many others. The contestant's minimum age is 18; there is no upper age limit.

The competition has met with considerable success over the years, attracting hundreds of candidates from more than 50 countries worldwide.^[3] One of the basic principles of the competition is the free choice of programme. There are no set pieces. The aim is not to limit the candidates, but to discover the works of musicians of their own choosing. Gérard Bekerman, the founder of the competition, claims that in Paris, the desire to "win" is outweighed by the love of music: "Pianists discover that the Competition for Outstanding Amateurs is not a competition but an 'anti-competition'. There are no opponents, no competitors, no judges, just music lovers".^[3]

The competition is held in three rounds:

Preliminaries: candidate's choice (10 minutes)
Semi-finals: a work by Bach and a romantic composition (15 minutes)
Finals: free program (30 minutes)

Ten to twelve semi-finalists and five or six finalists are selected each year.

Level

Poster of the final round of the 25th Competition (2014) with the programmes of the finalists

The originality of the competition lies in the fact that the competitors are not amateurs in the sense of "dabblers", but pianists, "who don’t just play the piano", musicians who, at some time in their lives, have had to make a choice, often a difficult one, between their profession and their potential career as a concert performer, the choice between making a living and their love of music.^[4]

As a result, the quality of the performance is very high. Many of the amateurs are real virtuosi; pianists often choose technically tough pieces by Liszt, Chopin or Rachmaninoff for their repertoire.^[5]

The winners have been invited to play with orchestral backing in the Sorbonne in Paris, under the baton of Georges Prêtre and the American conductor George Pehlivanian and, more recently, with the Symphony Orchestra of the Republican Guard of Paris directed by François Boulanger and the orchestra of the Paris Conservatorium of Music conducted by Pierre-Michel Durand. Many award winners have been invited to play at the Les Amateurs Virtuoses! festival, one of the most significant festivals for amateur pianists held all over the world.^[6]

Jury

Each year, the panel of judges consists of well-known pianists and key personalities: İdil Biret, Geneviève Joy-Dutilleux, Anne Queffelec, Sabine Lacoarret, Germaine Devèze, François-René Dûchable, Marc Laforet, Aldo Ciccolini, Michel Dalberto, Jay Gottlieb, Alexis Weissenberg, Marc-Olivier Dupin, Éric Heidsieck, Jean-Claude Pennetier, Dominique Merlet, Siheng Song, Michel Beroff, Nella Rubinstein and so on.

A second "press panel" consists of more than twenty music critics representing both the main European dailies and the national and international media.

Finally, there is an "audience award" which is given to the amateur pianist who has the most votes from the audience, collected at the final round of the competition.

Prize winners

Top prize winners (since 2006)
No.	Year	1st	2nd	3rd	Press award	Audience award
16th	2005	Thierry Goldwaser (software engineer) Ye Feng (international trade graduate)	Not Awarded	Hiroaki Taniguchi (public relations officer)	Ye Feng (international trade graduate)	Thierry Goldwaser (software engineer) Ye Feng (international trade graduate) (tie)
17th	2006	Thomas Yu (periodontist)	Rupert Egerton-Smith (lawyer) Dominik Winterling (concert director) (tie)	Not Awarded	Thomas Yu (periodontist)	Thomas Yu (periodontist)
18th	2007	Masanori Murakami (biochemical engineer)	Christopher Shih (gasteroenterologist)	Jamie Ng (financial analyst) Sandra Petit (lawyer)	Masanori Murakami (biochemical engineer)	Jamie Ng (financial analyst)
19th	2008	Christopher Shih (gasteroenterologist)	Kuntaro Deguchi Carl Dicasoli (biostatistician)	Not Awarded	Christopher Shih (gasteroenterologist)
20th	2009	Rupert Egerton-Smith (lawyer)	Dmytro Vynohradov (airline manager)	Romaine Coharde (meteorological engineer) Robert Fuchs (architect) (tie)	Romaine Coharde (meteorological engineer)	Rupert Egerton-Smith (lawyer)
21st	2010	Loïc Lafontaine (assistant manager)	Michael Cheung (management consultant)	Daniel Chow (chartered accountant)	Loïc Lafontaine (assistant manager)	Loïc Lafontaine (assistant manager)
22nd	2011	Simon Grisdale (interpreter) Robin Stephenson (mathematician) (tie)	Claire Rocher (mathematician)	Gorden Cheng (financial analyst)	Simon Grisdale (interpreter) Robin Stephenson (mathematician) (tie)	Robin Stephenson (mathematician)
23rd	2012	Dominic Piers Smith (race car designer)	Kensuke Ota (physicist)	Ricker Choi (financial analyst)		Dominic Piers Smith (race car designer)
24th	2013	Sylvain Carpentier (mathematician)	Paolo Gilardi (phycologist)	Jeremy Mätzener (law student)	Sylvain Carpentier (mathematician)	Sylvain Carpentier (mathematician)
25th	2014	Antoine Moreau (manager)	Thomas Prat (quantitative analyst)	Mikhail Dubov (computer scientist) June Wu (consultant) (tie)	Mikhail Dubov (computer scientist)	Thomas Prat (quantitative analyst)
26th	2015	Samuel Bach (mathematician) Michaël Slavin (ophthalmologist) (tie)	Not Awarded	Eric Rouach (estate agent)	Eric Rouach (estate agent)	Eric Rouach (estate agent) Samuel Bach (mathematician) (tie)
27th	2016	Olivier Korber (trader)	Olivier Dupont (financial engineer) Julien Cohen (mathematician) (tie)	Not Awarded	Olivier Korber (trader)	Olivier Korber (trader)
28th	2017	William Galton (mathematician)	Eric Rouach (estate agent)	Jean-Roch Le Henaff (medical student)	William Galton (mathematician)	Zach Weiner (software engineer)
30th	2022	Oliver Malle (medical doctor) Pierre Watrin (polytechnician) Eric Rouach (estate agent) (tie)	Not Awarded	Not Awarded	Oliver Malle (medical doctor) Pierre Watrin (polytechnician) (tie)	Amanda Kim (psychiatrist)
31st	2023	Zach Weiner (software engineer)	Cesare Grassi (taxi driver)	Sho Yamazaki (political analyst)	Zach Weiner (software engineer)	Cesare Grassi (taxi driver)
32nd	2024	Yasuko Komiyama (IT Sales Manager) Alexander Stabile (software engineer)	Din Zohar (doctor) Andrew Throdahl (marketing professional)	Hyunseo Uhm (Engineering Student)	Alexander Stabile (software engineer)	Yasuko Komiyama (IT Sales Manager)