The first "virtuoso amateur" pianist Festival on the African continent was held from 27 to 29 March in Tangier, with the participation of five pianists from France, Germany, England and Ireland, who amazed the Moroccan public with solo concerts featuring highly diversified works.
Through six concerts, piano lovers, both Moroccan and foreign, were invited to attend creations presented by exceptional musicians, who totally dominate their instrument, both technically and musically, having interpreted styles ranging from Bach to Gershwin, passing through Mozart, Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy, Ravel and Rachmaninov.
The festival-goers thus discovered rare artists on the scene who unveiled an unsuspected musical secret garden and made music a source of personal fulfilment, pleasure, sharing and passion.
Far from the image of the dilettante that one might associate with them, these amateur pianists love music to the point of devoting all their free time to it and achieving an extraordinary mastery of their instrument.
During the first day of this event, the Moroccan public was invited to two concerts of high technical quality given by the Irish pianist, Deirbhile Brennan, a chartered accountant who is a laureate of several music festivals in Ireland and the United Kingdom, and by Matthias Fischer, a German psychiatrist, who was able to interpret Chopin's 1st Sonata, "rarely heard in concert", according to the organisers, in addition to melodies by Mozart, Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and Moleiro.
The 2nd day was marked by a concert given by the French pianist Florian Chevalier, head of commercial strategy for the French group GDF Suez, who played the complete "Impromptus" by Schubert with great intelligence and sensitivity, as well as another show shared between several pianists who interpreted melodies by Leopold Godowsky, Fazil Say, Chopin, Old Ottoman Song Liszt and Tchaikovsky.
The closing concert was given by Dominique Piers-Smith, a Briton who chose to devote himself to aeronautics before returning to his instrument and winning the Yamaha Pianists competition in 2007, as well as a grand concert with two pianos face to face, where all the pianists played in duo works by renowned composers, including Soler, Brahms, Guastavino, Piazzolla and Ravel.
In a statement to MAP, the director of the French Institute of Tangier, Alexandre Pajon, assured that this event comes to respond to a significant musical demand expressed by lovers of this type of music in Morocco in general and at the level of the city of Tangier in particular, and for which the offer remains "insufficient", as evidenced by the fact that the organisation of this Festival required the importation of three pianos with tuners from Casablanca.
"Through this world Festival, we had the guarantee of presenting to the Moroccan public quality performances with an international character and of strengthening Morocco's openness to other cultures," specified the official, noting that this Festival aims to allow Moroccan spectators to get closer to this type of music and to attend concerts of global reach, while broadening the musical offer in Tangier, which remains dominated until now by Jazz, Arab-Andalusian and Amazigh music.
About a thousand spectators attended these six concerts scheduled during this festival, organised at the initiative of the French Institute of Tangier, in partnership with "the Piano Festival: virtuoso amateurs", a record figure which demonstrates, in the eyes of the official, that the Moroccan public was thirsty to discover this type of music live.
Asked about the lack of presence of Moroccan pianists, Pajon made it known that most pianists present on the Moroccan artistic scene are "professionals", while those of a comparable level, who have passed international competitions, do not exist for the moment, noting that for future events the organisers intend to invite young professionals to represent the Kingdom.
For his part, the artistic director of the "virtuoso amateurs" Festival, Julien Kurtz, assured that this event aims to allow amateur pianists of a very high level to perform in concert, noting that the pianists present in Tangier are finalists of international competitions for amateur pianists.
"This event comes to consecrate the strong cooperation ties linking Morocco and France and to further strengthen the Moroccan cultural tradition rooted in history," underlined Kurtz, noting that this Festival aims to give these talents the possibility to perform in concert before the Moroccan public who love this type of music, "without any idea of competition but just for the passion of music".
The grand closing concert took place in the presence of high officials, including the Consul General of Spain in Tangier, Artur Reig Tapia, and the Consul General of France in Tangier, Muriel Soret.
Les Amateurs Virtuoses is a piano festival unique in its kind. Launched in 2008 at Radio France in Paris, it has since been the first to have given exceptional amateur pianists the possibility to perform in concert, without any notion of competition.
Since 2011, it has taken place every year at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, while a travelling edition tours the world, visiting Rio de Janeiro, Shanghai, Budapest, Saint Petersburg, Buenos Aires and Rosario.
