Michael Hill International Violin Competition at the Auckland Town Hall

By WILLIAM DART

Two years ago, not having gone down to Queenstown and experienced the semifinals of the Michael Hill International Violin Competition for myself, I found the final Town Hall celebration curiously unsatisfying.

This time round, the Auckland Philharmonia has given us more of an idea of why and how the choices came about. Thursday's Honourable Awards recital in the concert chamber featured the fourth, fifth and sixth place-getters, and Shangshang Yao's Franck Sonata showed what a difference distance can make.

Down South, I was only a few metres away from this talented teenager; now there was all the formality of a concert hall. Yao seemed rather thinner in tone than I remembered and, despite a concerted effort with the splendid Sarah Watkins on piano, an imposing romantic statement was never really achieved.

Alexandra Osborne's Mozart Sonata K 301 made the journey well, although it lost its conversational intimacy in the new venue.

Yvonne Lam fared best, as I suspected she would. Her account of John Rimmer's The Dance of the Sibyl showed the style that assured her of a Merit Award the following evening, while her Prokofiev F minor Sonata again raised the question of why she wasn't playing on the Friday.

Twenty-four hours later, a capacity Town Hall audience proved that Aucklanders' love of competition is not limited to those who frequent Eden Park.

Australian Kristian Winther was charismatic in the Shostakovich First Concerto, combining brutal virtuosity with often tremulous emotion, especially in its Passacaglia.

Our own Natalia Lomeiko took on Brahms. The composer's luscious, curving lines were appropriately caressed, but at times tension slackened and flourishes were thin in tone.

True, the second movement was spun out with unerring rightness, but the mighty first movement Cadenza seemed unnecessarily fragmented, an approach she had used a few days before in her Bach Chaconne.

After the interval, Korbinian Altenberger's Sibelius was beautifully proportioned, but the German was strangely reserved in platform manner and projection.

Lomeiko was a popular favourite and turned out the winner. Before any bow had touched a string, we had been told that the judges were taking into account what had already been heard in Queenstown, which I felt should have given second place-getter Winther a slight edge.

But such are the vagaries of life in the competition lane. Let us not forget that the most important thing is that this competition exists.

It is a credit to all involved, above all to the orchestra and Miguel Harth-Bedoya who, with just a few days' notice, clocked up sterling performances of three major concertos.