13th Leeds International Piano Competition

With a first prize of £12,000, the guarantee of well over a hundred public engagements, and a chance to play a concerto with Sir Simon Rattle and the CBSO in the finals, the 13th Leeds International Piano Competition retains its position as one of the major launching pads for an international career. Out of the 71 competitors from all over the world, and selected from 298 entries who descended on Leeds for the first round of the triennial competition, six made it through the finals, presented live from Leeds Town Hall on Radio 3 and filmed by television for a programme of edited highlights to be shown on BBC 2 on 1 October.

With a first prize of £12,000, the guarantee of well over a hundred public engagements, and a chance to play a concerto with Sir Simon Rattle and the CBSO in the finals, the 13th Leeds International Piano Competition retains its position as one of the major launching pads for an international career. Out of the 71 competitors from all over the world, and selected from 298 entries who descended on Leeds for the first round of the triennial competition, six made it through the finals, presented live from Leeds Town Hall on Radio 3 and filmed by television for a programme of edited highlights to be shown on BBC 2 on 1 October.

For only the second time in nearly 20 years, a Brit reached the finals. The highly promising 23-year-old Ashley Wass from Skegness, awarded fifth prize this year, can take comfort in the knowledge that when Ian Hobson won first prize in 1981, Peter Donohoe was relegated to sixth place.

Competitions don't mean everything. On the evidence of Wass's semi-final recital, including a sharply defined account of Berg's Sonata Op 1 and a performance of Barber's Sonata that, despite his attack on the punchy final fugue, never once lost sight of the work's lyricism, this assured young pianist undoubtedly has a future. For the final concerto round he, along with two fellow competitors, chose Brahms's No 1 in D minor. Here, despite his obvious musicianship, focused technique and sensitive, poised approach to the dreamy adagio, it was ultimately a performance lacking that extra element of white-hot intensity.

Of the other two finalists, both Italian, who were also playing Brahms, it was left to the 22-year-old Alessio Bax, playing last of all, to take the first prize. His control and eloquence, his innate understanding of the work's logic and impetus, and those additional magical ingredients - weight of sound, clarity of detail and an absolute conviction in his conception of the music - allowed those of us hearing the concerto for the third time to enjoy it afresh. Whatever long deliberations the 14-strong jury may have endured, the decision it reached was surely the right one, and certainly pleased the packed hall.

There was a lot of support, too, for Davide Franceschetti, whose volcanic force gave Brahms's finale a raw fierceness that provoked some loud cheers at the end of the first evening of the finals. He was awarded second prize.

Another Italian, Christiano Burato, must also have been pleased, even with fourth prize. His last attempt at the competition ended in disaster when he fell and dislocated his shoulder mounting the steps to the stage in the first round. His performance of Chopin's Piano Concerto No 2 in F minor was poetic and stylish, if lacking the last ounce in imaginative characterisation. But, at 31, his reputation is already established, and we can expect to hear plenty more of him.

The astonishingly cool German pianist, Severin von Eckardstein, took third place for his brilliantly steely rendering of Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No 2 and also - well-deserved for his exacting semi-final performance of part of Messiaen's Catalogue d'oiseaux - the Contemporary Music Prize.

The competition's youngest competitor, 15-year-old Tatiana Kolessova from Moscow, was placed sixth, but the power and passion she unleashed in Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto created maximum impact and excitement. Her name and playing will be eagerly listened out for in the future.

If the finalists were on knife-edge, then so, too, were the Competition organisers under Fanny Waterman, for, as the competitors sweated their way through the first three rounds, builders, painters and electricians struggled to complete the major refurbishment of Leeds Town Hall on time. Ergonomic seating, the addition of handsome boxes along the side walls at first gallery level, and tasteful redecoration has shed the Town Hall of its rather dingy, uncomfortable past and, most importantly, significantly improved its previously unsympathetic acoustic. Definitely another winner.