A star is born at Erasmus Huis
By Mehru Jaffer
JAKARTA (JP): A star was born at Erasmus Huis last week when soft-spoken Alpin Limando, 18, was honored as the winner of this year's piano competition organized by the Indonesian Composers Association.
A resident of Bandung who looks forward to studying business management at university, Alpin has been playing the piano since he was six years old. But it remains a hobby with the shy pianist who loves Beethoven.
He does not see himself playing the piano as a profession. Alpin plans to buy a nice present for his mother with the Rp 3.5 million he received along with a trophy for winning the contest, and will put the rest of the money in the bank.
It is Alpin's mother who is responsible for instilling in her son his great love for western classical music. Alpine grew up listening to his mother sing at the local church and is the only one out of three children to share her passion for the piano.
The competition attracted 17 contestants from all over the country, out of which six made it to the finals. Otto Sidharta, the head of the composers association, feels there is so much talent in the country that is not discovered while the would-be musicians are still young. And one way to uncover this talent is to get these youngsters together at competitions and concerts.
Although Otto admits he could not depend upon music to earn a living, he feels the times are changing. "For a long time there has been confusion in this country over what is art. As society becomes more open and accepting there will remain a place for western classical music even in a very traditional society like ours," he told The Jakarta Post.
He is optimistic about the future of western classical music here and thrilled at all the local talent that was displayed at the competition.
The association also will help the youngsters play at concerts in the future. According to Addie MS, the conductor of the Twilite Orchestra, the audience is there and composers are creating plenty of music, but there is an acute shortage of performers. Competitions like this one help find performers who may be playing great music in their little corners, totally unknown to the world.
Genssly Ediansyah, 17, who won a special prize for the best interpretation of a work by an Indonesian composer, returned to Surabaya, her hometown, with a cash prize of Rp 1 million, a certificate and a trophy. The bespectacled Genssly, who bursts into giggles every time she is asked a question, played Suite Villgaets, a very eastern piece throbbing with the sounds of the countryside and conjuring up images of a village belle caught in the act of dancing as if without a care in the world.
Genssly said she learned the piece when she was seven years old and then forgot all about it. As she prepared for the competition, the composition returned on its own to haunt her and she began to practice it all over again. And this time she was not just imitating the notes blindly but playing the music with great love and admiration for the composer.
Her older sister, Brigifine, 21, chose Fragmen, a piece by Jaya Suprana that is full of flute sounds and vigorous drumming. She placed second in the competition and said she would use part of her Rp 2 million cash prize to have her car repaired, which she damaged on the eve of the competition as she was so preoccupied with her music. She also will use 10 percent of the amount as a gift to God to thank him for being there with her while she played on stage.
Brigifine loves Beethoven as much as Alpine does. "But not being a very romantic woman, I play Beethoven differently than Alpin. In his hands Beethoven is transformed into something soft and calm, whereas I prepare for war when I play Beethoven," Brigifne explained, guessing that she may have lost to Alpine because she did not prepare for her Chopin piece as well as she had wished.
Brigifine already has 35 private students in Surabaya and is one of the few youngsters who cannot think of doing anything else in life but play music. Ideally she would love to marry a businessman for whom she could play the piano when he was tired and stressed, so he would be revived and return to making more money, she laughed.
Even as a three-year-old, Brigifine would imitate pianists she saw on television, tapping her fingers on a table as if it was a keyboard.
Since her father could not afford to buy a piano for a long time, he eventually rented one from a music shop and hired Sienny Debora, a piano teacher with a great reputation, to teach both girls at home.
Brigifine, a third-year student of information technology who spent the day after the competition shopping for clothes and gifts at Mangga Dua and Block M, is already preparing for a forthcoming competition to be held next month in Brisbane, Australia. Good luck, Brigifine.