The first bars of the Ilmari Hannikainen piano competition were played in Jyväskylä in the mid-1970s. The competition is currently a piano chamber music competition between ensembles.
The international Ilmari Hannikainen piano chamber music competition starts in Jyväskylä today.
The competition begins with a two-day national youth series, where pianists aged 13–20 living in Finland play with their ensembles.
The 15 bands of the international series will start their week-long competition work on Thursday. The group forms are violin-piano and piano-piano duo and violin-cello-piano trio.
In the Ilmari Hannikainen competition, premieres will be heard, as a competition composition from three composers has been commissioned for each ensemble format.
The first performances of the commissioned compositions will be heard in the semi-finals of the international series on Saturday and Sunday. The venue for the competition is the Hannikaisali of the Finnish Music Campus from Tuesday to Sunday.
Both finals of the Ilmari Hannikainen piano chamber music competition can be followed live on Yle Radio 1, where the broadcast starts both evenings at 19:02 and as a live stream on Yle Areena.
The competition is organized by the Central Finland Music Promotion Foundation.