Leeds International Piano Competition addresses gender gap

Leeds International Piano Competition has this week revealed the 65 pianists who will take part in its 2024 competition. This year’s competition will be the first edition conducted under new measures designed to ‘tackle the long-standing issue of male dominance in the piano world’ and will introduce a new Alexandra Dariescu Award for an outstanding performance of a work by a female composer.

The 2024 Competition is Leeds International’s first to implement blind judging in the shortlisting process and has also introduced unconscious bias training for all jury members, with support available to all competitors to ensure a balanced competition. The 65 shortlisted pianists, 20 of whom are women, were selected from a record 366 applications.

Competition CEO Fiona Sinclair said: ‘We need to create a more equitable stage and address the gender gap, a longstanding issue in the piano world. The Leeds’ own record shows that just two women have triumphed in the past 20 Editions of the Competition, only a third of our applications this year have come from women and only 18% of the most recent top 40 international piano competitions have been won by women. The imbalance becomes even more marked at the very top level of the world stage where, across many of the leading festivals and venues around the world, male pianists continue to dominate.’

The 65 chosen competitors will take part in the competition’s first round held in April across six international centres, Berlin, Paris, Vienna, Beijing, Seoul and New York, where competitors’ performance will be filmed and shared digitally with the jury. Pianists proceeding to round two will travel to Leeds in September, before the competition finals in Bradford.

This year’s competition will also see the introduction of a new award in honour of 2024 competition co-presenter Alexandra Dariescu. The Alexandra Dariescu Award for an outstanding performance of a work by woman composer will be accompanied by new education initiative Count Me In! and an increased number of works by women in the Competition repertoire.

Alongside the new additions to the competition, this year’s edition will see the return of the Leeds Piano Trail with sculptures made from upcycled pianos (as well as playable pianos) presented across Leeds and Bradford. Competition medallists will also be competing for the competition’s usual prize package including a cash prize alsongside artist representation with Askonas Holt, a record deal with Warner Classics, tours with Steinway & Sons in South Korea and Europe, and concerts in the UK and beyond.