They Came From Far and Wide

Thursday evening saw the penultimate event of the Annual Music Competition with our Overseas Final, which celebrates the musicians from our Section Finals who hail from overseas, and this year we had four incredible musicians from New Zealand and Australia. 

The antipodean-flavoured evening began with Italian-Australian pianist Jonathan Ferrucci who performed a programme including Bach’s Partita No.2 in C Minor movement 4, Albeniz, Ravel and Scriabin’s Prelude for the Left Hand. Jonathan was followed by New Zealand baritone Kieran Rayner, who performed a varied programme ranging from Handel’s Samson, to Butterworth’s A Shropshire Lad, to Phidyle by Duparc.

The second half began with violist Alexander McFarlane from New Zealand, accompanied by fellow Kiwi Somi Kim. He opened the second half with the first movement of Rebecca Clarke’s Sonata for Viola and Piano in E Major, before performing the first three movements of Schumann’s Marchenbileder. Closing the concert was former Pettman/ROSL Chamber Music prizewinner Bradley Wood on piano, who performed a programme including the Prelude and Fugue in C-Sharp Minor from the Well-Tempered Clavier, Debussy’s first movement from Images, Book 1, and finishing with Liszt’s Ballade No.2 in B Minor.

After their final deliberation the judges announced the overall winner as Alexander McFarlane, who will be the recipient of the Lorna Viol Memorial Prize, as well as the ROSL Trophy for the most Outstanding Musician from Overseas. The trophy for this prize is a commission from the Royal College of Art. Kieran Rayner was awarded the Phillip Crawshaw Memorial Prize for an Outstanding Musician from Overseas, the Tait Memorial Scholarship for an Outstanding Australian Musician was awarded to Jonathan Ferrucci, and the ROSL Award for an Outstanding New Zealand Musician was awarded to Bradley Wood. Everyone's a winner!

All of our prizewinners will be invited to the Gold Medal Final on Monday 4 June in the Queen Elizabeth Hall, while we watch our four solo Section Finalists battle it out for the Gold Medal, and prize money of £15,000. Tickets for this unmissable event are available here.

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