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Two Utah women are among the 72 competitors selected to participate in the Seventh Cliburn International Amateur Piano Competition, running Sunday through June 25 in Fort Worth, Texas.
Madalyn Taylor, 66, has helped run a family-owned tire store in Ogden for 46 years. She's also a seamstress and professional candy maker. While she took piano lessons as a child and studied music at Weber State University, according to a Cliburn news release, piano took a back seat to Taylor's six children and for several years. Since resuming studies with Eugene Watanabe, she has won awards at the 2008 Seattle International Amateur Competition and the Bradshaw & Buono International Competition. She was a Cliburn Amateur semifinalist in 2011.
Jane Gibson King, 60, of Provo, was a finalist and received the Press Jury Award at the 2011 Cliburn Amateur Competition. She has bachelor's and master's degrees in piano from Brigham Young University and has been a soloist with the Utah Symphony and other orchestras. She, too, studies with Eugene Watanabe. King spent 30 years as a full-time mother of four children and is an advocate for her son Michael, who has autism. She also volunteers her sewing skills for Days for Girls International.
This year's Cliburn Amateur competitors represent 21 countries — Brazil, Canada, China, Cuba, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, South Africa, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, United Kingdom and United States — and range in age from 35 to 68. Among them are marketing executives, a TV and film composer, attorneys, software engineers, a sommelier, a voice actor, financial advisers, stay-at-home mothers, an administrative-law judge, a minister of music and liturgy, accountants, engineers and several physicians.
The quadrennial competition, established in 1999, is open to nonprofessional pianists 35 and older who do not derive their principal source of income through piano performance or instruction. Former Cliburn International Piano Competition gold medalist Olga Kern is head of the seven-member jury. At stake are cash prizes, including $2,000 for first place. —
Watch online
The Cliburn International Amateur Competition begins Sunday, June 19. Can't make it to Texas? The entire event will be webcast live at cliburn.org.
The schedule • Preliminary round, 8-to-10-minute recital programs, Sunday and Monday, June 19-20; quarterfinal round, 15-to-18-minute programs by 30 pianists, Tuesday and Wednesday, June 21-22; semifinals, 25-to-28-minute programs by 12 pianists, Thursday, June 23; final round, six pianists each performing a concerto movement with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, Saturday, June 25. Check the website for times; note that Fort Worth is in the Central time zone, an hour ahead of Salt Lake City.