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I imagine she is just exhausted. It is a long and grueling competition, and, were I in here shoes, I would be ready to have some closure and rest.

I believe this is kinda brave statement to call some interpretation "accurate". Especially after competition, in which Gadijev and Garcia Garcia received second and third prize. Accurate is purely subjective feeling, and mostly it is based on your life experience and the way you were educated, what you were listening in you life etc.

In the above video of the winner's concert am I correct in thinking Bruce Li plays the Chopin Waltz with what a would call at Viennese lilt at around 4 hours 30 seconds in the video and at later parts of his performance? I don't personally mind this but I have never heard any great pianist play a Chopin Waltz that way, and I thought it was considered inappropriate.

Many things in music are subjective, yes, but some are not. In the phrases I mentioned earlier, Cho pushes and pulls in a very bizarre and unmusical way, contradictory to the emotional logic of the phrases. This isn't a matter of opinion, I'm afraid.

When a non professional is highly critical of one of the best pianists in the world, my usual thought is that the pianist they are criticizing probably played better both technically and musically at age 12 than the person doing the criticizing has ever played. The whole idea of criticizing a performance based on a few phrases is inappropriate and IMO shows hypercritical thinking.

You are free to think that.

I think what Bruce Liu said about (his basic approach?) 'finding the freshness in the music' really helps.

I had exactly the same thought. It seemed fine to me. Likewise at 5:25, I thought the phrasing and articulation were rather good.

That poster assumes he is the be all and end all of Chopin playing, understanding, etc.

It is true that he does phrase it in 5.25 slightly differently from most other pianists. The accentuation is not exactly as the same place. But i guess it is part of his personal choice.

No, I just understand how to phrase.

I'm afraid I don't hear it at 5:25 - but something definitely is a tad "off" at 7:45.

Tonight was the 2nd Laureate Concert, basically a repeat of yesterday, but at a different venue. Most players played better after a nights rest, especially Gadjiev (who corrected his mistakes in Op. 44 Polanaise and Bruce Liu in the Concerto, who gave a very secure and even better reading tonight. And 2 encores!

Bear in mind all players got well accustomed to this hall during the past weeks and probably feel almost at home on this stage now. I mean both in terms of less stress but also knowing the acoustics. The yesterday's venue was an entirely different place for them. Also, not a great place for solo piano to be honest.

Good Lord, talk about dragging things out. Is there a 3rd Laureate Concert?

Haha, actually yes, tomorrow afternoon.

It's a little bit, i don't know, this is clearly about polish national pride, the prime minister himself spoke at winners ceremony, and it's just once every 5 years, so big thing in Poland. But hearing the same concert again and again... The man only wrote 2, sadly, so i think they should allow certain repertoire from other composers

Schumann or Liszt perhaps?

Well, there's always Paderewski.

After listening to Liu's concerto in the first winners gala really took me by surprise. It was more sensitive and expressive and I so wished we saw more of this throughout the comp, but it lessened my qualms with him as the winner. More thoughts to come later...

Okay, I've listened to Rubinstein at the equivalent of the 7:45 mark for Cho's performance. Rubinstein takes a noticeable ritard at this section in preparation for the ascending chords to follow (marked ff). Where Rubinstein takes his pronounced ritard, Cho slows down at first and then takes the final two chords faster prior to beginning the ascending chord sequence. Cho keeps a fairly strict tempo before approaching the slowdown, and then speeds up afterward to maintain that same tempo, in what is a "borrowing and repaying approach." I had a teacher in the 70's who taught performance this way: if you slowed down in a group of measures, you had to speed up to equalize the time. It was a legitimate performance technique then and common in the 19th century too. Sustaining the tempo overall, "on balance," creates excitement and tension, and a sense of propulsion.

Rubinstein's approach creates temporary excitement, but he violates the score, while Cho does not. As you may know, Chopin's performance style rarely used unmarked ritards except in changes from one major section to another. Otherwise he kept fairly strict time. In this Ballade, an example would be the change in key signature from E major back to Ab, which would allow for a slight, unmarked slowdown. The proof of this is in the score. There is not a single ritard called for in the entire Ballade until the very end, and this poco rit. is part of a sequence: allargando (slower and majestic) for two bars, stretto (gradually faster) for three bars, poco rit. for the next two bars, and finally piu mosso (faster - original tempo) for the conclusion of the Ballade. Chopin tells us quite explicity that the only time he wants a pronounced slow-down in this Ballade is at the very end. As you also know, Chopin was meticulous about his scores, reworking them until he felt they were perfect. If he does not call for a ritard in the score, it should not be performed. Rubinstein is therefore grossly inaccurate in his performance of this Ballade.

On the other hand....listening to these competitors, most everyone these days does what Rubinstein did, throwing in ritards, poco ritards, ritardandos, calandos, and smorzandos all over the place, and ignoring Chopin completely. It's our attempt to ooze out every bit of emotion possible out of Chopin's music. We have to take it as it is, forgiving Rubinstein for being modern, and forgiving Cho for being accurate.

Paderewski wrote a most excellent piano concerto in a minor. The middle movement is lovely. It used to be quite popular and deserves to be brought back.