When it comes to piano competitions, there are two main approaches to splitting the contestants into groups: based on age and based on level of experience. The first approach (based on age) by far is the most widely used in majority of national and international piano competitions around the world. While age used to be a good indicator of skill level for young pianists, it is hardly so nowadays. This is why many competitions now have to pre-screen the contestants and “weed out” the late beginners from the competition mostly to save them and parents from embarrassment of ending up on the stage competing with pianists who are light years ahead in terms of experience at the same age. In other words, if Joe is 9 and he started to play piano 1 year ago and play simple grade 1 pieces, while Emma who is also 9 but she started to play at 3 and not plays Chopin and Liszt, these are no competitors because at the same age one is a complete beginner and another one is an advanced pianist. So majority of piano competitions “get rid” of Joes during the pre-screening to have a comparable quality of performers on stage.
This is exactly why for our first Saudi Classical Piano competition it was decided to subdivide the contestants based on their level of piano experience rather than age. This division will give the opportunity to “late starters” to compete with other pianists of the same level of experience and thus grow in their performance skill without feeling embarrassed by young prodigies.
SCPC2025 has a goal of raising awareness of public of classical piano music and providing local pianists with an opportunity to perform their favorite pieces in a comfortable setting.