Van Cliburn Semifinals: Lynov, Park, Starikov, Johnson
Cliburn semifinalists play Mozart concertos with conductor Carlos Miguel Prieto and the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra on Thursday evening, May 29, 2025. (Photos by Ralph Lauer and Brandon Wade)
—Wayne Lee Gay
May 29 (evening): Russian Philipp Lynov, 26, opened the Mozart concerto phase of the 2025 Cliburn Competition with Mozart's earliest mature piano concerto, No. 9 in E-flat; Mexican Carlos Miguel Prieto, current music director of the North Carolina Symphony, conducted the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. Nicknamed the "Jeunehomme Concerto," the No. 9 is unusual among classical-era concertos in that the soloist enters immediately, setting up a joint effort, in which the FWSO and conductor Prieto responded to Lynov's glittering, fluid reading with a smooth suavity. Sighing motifs flowed through the sometimes dark middle movement in C minor, and sparkling passage work from Lynov dominated the dialogue of soloist and orchestra in the finale, closing with a gleefully triumphant return of the movement's main theme. Lynov utilized Mozart's original cadenzas throughout.
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South Korean Chaeyoung Park, 27, turned to Mozart's Concerto No. 20 in D minor, a dark work anticipating musical romanticism. (It reigned as the Mozart concerto throughout the nineteenth century and much of the twentieth.) Park and conductor Prieto certainly played into those aspects of the work, though weakening their case with unsteady tempos in the first movement. Alternating passages of serenity and storms dominate the ensuing movements, with passages reminiscent of Mozart's operas. Park used the showy cadenzas by American musicologist Robert Levin in her performance, which ultimately elicited a very strong ovation from the audience.
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Israeli-Russian pianist Vitaly Starikov, 30, performed Concerto No. 23 in A, the one work that has largely replaced No. 20 as the most frequently performed item in the canon of Mozart's piano concerto. Starikov and Prieto successfully outlined the magical blend of desire and joy that Mozart offers here, punctuated by Starikov's own strikingly virtuoso but fully integrated cadenza. This is one of Mozart's most operatic concertos, and Starikov produced a wonderful singing tone throughout.
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Canadian Carter Johnson, 28, joined conductor Prieto and the orchestra for another of Mozart's more cheerful concertos, No. 22 in E-flat. A fanfare-like theme announces the first-movement dialogue between orchestra and soloist; Johnson provided a solid foundation against the pungently colored orchestra responses. In the work's two cadenza moments, Johnson used his own at one point, and also one by French pianist David Fray. Aappropriately smooth, clean technique characterized Johnson's performance throughout.
