Competitions: Pinnacles and pitfalls - An Interview with Daniel Pollack

A prizewinner in the first Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition (1958), Daniel Pollack was invited, following the competition, for a two-month concert tour throughout the Soviet Union, becoming the first American to record on the Soviet Melodya label. Over the next several decades many recordings followed, all of which sold in the millions across the Soviet Union. Several were subsequently re-issued on other labels and distributed worldwide. “The Legendary Moscow Recitals,”a collection of his first Melodya recordings, was recently reissued, worldwide. Invited for fifteen subsequent concert tours in Russia, he returned again in 2008 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the Competition, performing Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto in Moscow Conservatory’s famed concert hall, the Bolshoi Zal, to a sold-out crowd.

Performing throughout the world across five continents, Pollack’s appearances in major music centers have included London’s Royal Festival Hall, Vienna’s Musikverein, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Buenos Aires' Teatro Colon, Seoul's Arts Center, Moscow's Bolshoi Zal, New York's Carnegie Hall, Chicago's Orchestra Hall, and the Los Angeles Music Center. Additional highlights of Pollack's career include guest appearances at Tchaikovsky's home in Kline, Russia where he performed on the composer's piano, and a performance at a joint session of the United States Congress honoring the late President Harry Truman.

He was invited to be on the international piano jury of the Tchaikovsky Competition three times, serving once as Vice-Chairman. Pollack has served on juries of more than 100 international piano competitions, including the Montreal in Canada, Queen Elizabeth in Belgium, Leeds in England, Hamamatsu and Sonoda in Japan, Han Romanson in Seoul, Anton Rubinstein in Dresden, Maria Callas in Athens, UNISA in South Africa, Ciurlionis in Lithuania, Prokofiev in St. Petersburg, Rachmaninoff in Moscow, Horowitz in Kiev, Jose Iturbi in Los Angeles, and Gina Bachauer in Salt Lake City.

Pollack has held several visiting artist faculty positions including The Juilliard School, Columbia University and Yale's School of Music. He is currently Professor of Piano at the Thornton School of Music of the University of Southern California.

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Additional Exerpts from the Interview

When did competitions become the modern day “sponsors” of careers?

It makes me think historically back to the many sponsor entities that have lent support to classical music over several centuries. We have to thank royalty, rich patrons and religious organizations that sponsored many of the composers we love today. Without those sponsors, which admittedly were usually self-serving for the courts’, churches’ or rich patrons’ pleasures, we would not have the likes of Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Chopin, Liszt, etc. In the seventeenth and eighteenth century there were informal competitions that were the result of subjective tastes, like the Emperor of the Austrian Empire choosing between Salieri and Mozart for his court composer.

Competitions, as we know them today, began in 1895 with the first Anton Rubinstein Competition in Berlin. The winner of the Gold Medal was Josef Lhévinne and it launched his brilliant career. In the last 115 years, however, many competitions have come and gone. There was the Schubert in the 1920s; the NY-based Leventritt, which offered for a few decades (no longer) a NY Philharmonic appearance; and a Rachmaninoff Competition in San Francisco won by Seymour Lipkin around 1949, which was discontinued. (There is an entirely different Rachmaninoff Competition presently in Moscow.) Leon Fleisher was the first American to win the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels right after World War II, which launched his career. With the devastation in Europe after the war, competitions became somewhat political, not in terms of prizewinners but in terms of “cultural wars” between countries. Countries strove to outdo each other in sponsoring cultural events and the competition arena widened significantly.

In the case of the 1958 Tchaikovsky Competition, it was somewhat different. The Soviet government supported the arts in general more than any other government entity worldwide. Promoting excellence at competitions was seen as a critical export for their country, whether at the Olympics, in music competitions, or in other international arenas. The Soviets had an unprecedented focus on training. And yes, there was a singular concentration on having Russians take the major prizes. Put that together with two Americans in the lineup of Russian winners and this had a worldwide socio-political impact.

But the sad reality today is that even the most prestigious tier one competitions are not launching careers as they did in the past.

Can you give us some thoughts on how international piano competitions work?

Most competitions have several eliminating rounds and varying repertoire requirements. Often there is a mandatory work, specially composed for the competition. This is a good thing and it puts new works into the repertoire of contestants. Also, most competitions require contrasting styles in the required repertoire. Some competitions have wisely chosen to allow contestants to build their own programs, which I think is the wave of future competitions. After all, not all great pianists play the entire repertoire on the same great level, so why should we expect young artists to excel in all styles of music? I feel that they should play the repertoire that is close to their heart and passion.

There are many variants. Some competitions have a specific required work (not a commissioned composition) that all contestants have to play. I once heard 120 renditions of Beethoven’s Sussmayr Variations in the Queen Elisabeth competition, and it was fascinating. I heard so many interesting versions that I could see why they selected this obscure ten-minute piece. Some require contestants to play a piece from their home country, and since the piano repertoire is so vast, I often hear magnificent repertoire for the first time.

Beyond politics and the promotion of specific students, what other prejudices might influence jurors?

Today many international jurors are hearing the same contestants in different competitions playing the same repertoire. Recently when I was in Belgium for the Queen Elisabeth, one of my colleagues said, “I don’t want to hear that contestant play the Liszt Sonata in B Minor because I just heard him play it in Tokyo.” I said, “Why shouldn’t we hear it again? I wasn’t in Tokyo, and how do you know that it won’t be different here?” I think this juror didn’t want to hear a large romantic work with lots of notes that takes 30 minutes to play. I have frequently heard comments like this that penalize contestants because of juror prejudice against a piece.

I have also been on juries where jurors will not vote for a very talented contestant because they see it as a threat to their own career. That would be like teaching a very gifted student and withholding all the wonderful things I could show them about tone production, fingering, hand shape, etc. What kind of teacher would I be if I kept secrets that would be helpful? There are many very personal issues involved, and I believe that if you agree to be on a jury, an unspoken decorum is expected. I follow my own conscience and will not rule out certain contestants or repertoire.

Other personal types of prejudices influence jurors and I will not hear of it.  Personally I don’t care if they are male or female or if their hand is large or small, etc. I am not impressed that a gown came from the House of Dior, or whether I can smell their fine perfume.

But these conversations do happen. By all ethical standards they should be eliminated.

You said that many of the same jurors hear the same contestants in different competitions. I have read there is a “club” of traveling jurors that control international competitions. Is this true?

A lot of my colleagues do move from one competition to another, with the same group adjudicating many of the international competitions. For instance, they could have heard a pianist play in Israel, and now the same group hears her in England, and then again in Japan, all within a year. In the real inner core of international jurors, there are between four and twelve. With this many, the group can control the judging.

Can this be rectified?

I believe there should be a revolving jury pool, and juries should be expanded to include prominent conductors and managers who could engage the winner for concerts. This would help them expand their roster of artists and find young talent. I would also like to see directors of concert series, composers, and critics on juries. I think there should be more cooperation between sponsors of competitions and sponsors of concert organizations. I also think it is important that a pianists serving on a jury be a current performers—not someone who had a career fifty years ago. The projection of musical ideas and thoughts comes only from a performer.

It takes time to be on juries as competitions can run from one to four weeks. I feel that my performing colleagues should make an effort to take this time from their schedules. They owe it to the profession and the next generation of pianists. They don’t need to judge every competition, but there is some obligation to “give back.” Madame Lhévinne used to say, “As you are moving up the ladder of success, stepping over people, remember in your lifetime, you will be stepping over people on your way back down.” Maybe it is a Russian proverb, but there is a lot to it. We are in an art that is about communication, and how you treat people will come back to you.

What do the current demographics of competitors look like?

More and more contestants and winners are coming from Asia, particularly China, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan, with fewer Europeans and Americans. Russia and the Ukraine still have a solid contingency. In the last International Chopin Competition held in Warsaw, half of the 80 contestants were from Japan, while in the last Cliburn the majority of contestants were from Asia.

American participation is at an extremely low point. Americans need to be competing and they are not. I believe it is due to a lack of funds, not a lack of ability. In the past, they could apply for a Rockefeller Grant to get travel funds or a grant from a cultural organization within the State Department or the National Endowment of the Arts. These funds seem to have dried up or are little known to contestants. Without funding, American participation will continue to diminish.   This is an area where corporate sponsors could step in.

I have always been surprised to see you at so many national MTNA Conferences during the past thirty years.

It shouldn't come as a surprise. I feel it as an obligation to my colleagues to participate. It is a great organization and I am very proud of my involvement with it. Teachers thrive on learning from each other and if I can contribute my professional experience and expertise I feel I must. I also would like to persuade other performing artists to participate and share their own experiences both on the concert stage and in teaching. It is a multi-faceted organization and I feel a responsibility to lead by example—in other words—participate.

On an aside, weren’t you involved in a movie called “The Competition” starring Amy Irving and Richard Dreyfuss?

Yes. Composer Lalo Schifrin asked me to perform the winning concerto in this movie, in this case the Prokofiev Third Piano Concerto. It was a wonderful opportunity. We even recorded in different studios to make it sound more like practicing and competing at a competition. Schifrin used a lot of his own music in the overall movie score as well as original repertoire.  Amy was trained for six months to look like a professional pianist. 

It was a popular movie and allowed moviegoers the privilege getting into the life of a contestant: the fears, the nerves, and the excitement. It did wonders for the image of what pianists go through at competitions.

What is the point of so many competitions if they do not become triggers for careers?

The number of competitions keeps growing, and there should be either a reduction or a better weeding out process. But I don’t see that happening. In fact I see it going the other way. There are over 700 piano competitions now, and I think there are going to be more and more. Still, contestants do get exposure they would otherwise not have. Young contestants can gain experience and confidence from entering smaller local competitions before they tackle larger ones. Besides, there is always the chance that there is someone in the audience who can help boost a career.

If not competitions, what else can help move careers forward?

In the past, great managers like Sol Hurok helped build careers, but I don’t see anyone like that today. Others gained international fame through stepping in when someone cancelled—Andre Watts comes to mind. Glenn Gould’s recording of the Goldberg Variations launched his career. Ivo Pogorelich developed an international career by not winning. When he was eliminated from the Chopin Competition in Warsaw, Martha Argerich called a press conference and declared him to be a genius. Evgeny Kissin made a career with the backing of the Soviet Union and just about eclipsed the career of Gold Medal winner of the Cliburn Competition, the late and most gifted and talented, Alexei Sultanov.

I really believe that corporate sponsors such as Coca-Cola should enter the field and help launch worldwide careers. I chose Coca-Cola because it is a brand that is recognized worldwide. If they wanted to promote talent, they could find it through a competition. In the past, the Soviet and later the Russian government was the sole sponsor of the Tchaikovsky Competition. Since 1991 they have added corporate sponsors such as Gazprom from Russia, and Pioneer Electronics from Japan.

 

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