Congratulations to semifinalists in the Wisconsin Youth Piano Competition

Posted on: May 19th, 2015

PianoArts and the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra are pleased to announce the semifinalists in the 2015 Wisconsin Youth Piano Competition, June 14 and 15, at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music. Semifinalists range in ages from ten to sixteen. Participating will be Andrew Cannestra, age sixteen, from Greenfield; Cynthia Cao, age eleven, from Whitefish Bay; Corona Chen, age ten, from Whitefish Bay; Eric Chen, age fifteen, from Brookfield; Andy Liu, age twelve, from Oconomowoc; Liam Mayo, age sixteen, from Green Bay; Joshua White, age sixteen, from Germantown; and Michael Wu, age thirteen, from Sun Prairie.  The preliminary jury – Dr. Juanita Becker, professor of piano at Wisconsin Lutheran College; Francisco Lecce-Chong, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra associate conductor; and Dr. Margaret (“Peggy”) Otwell, professor of piano and piano pedagogy at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee – chose the semifinalists through an anonymous audition via compact disc recordings. All semifinalists performed a solo and the first movement of a concerto composed by J. S. Bach, Ludwig van Beethoven, Felix Mendelssohn, or Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

The jury for the semifinal and final rounds of competition are Wilanna Kalkhof, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra’s Melitta S. Pick Endowed Piano Chair; Sandra Shapiro, an acclaimed concert pianist, dean of the preparatory division of the Cleveland Institute of Music, and Milwaukee native; and Tyler Wottrich, concert pianist and professor at North Dakota State University, and 2006 PianoArts North American Competition alum.

A collaboration of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and PianoArts, the Wisconsin competition, for ages ten through sixteen, is a biennial competition. The PianoArts North American Piano Competition, for ages 16 through twenty, is held in the opposite (even) years. All North American semifinalists perform with Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra musicians and the finalists perform complete concertos with the full orchestra.