Why hasn’t his career taken off?
Maybe they wouldn’t let him take his chair with him? 
There are a lot of competition pianists from that time who you (are at least I) never hear about anymore; Joyce Yang, Sa Chen, Chu-fang Huang, Alexei Kobrin etc.
Coincidentally, not to long ago, I criticized a video in which he was performing something by Schubert, I believe, and I didn’t realize it was his personal channel on youtube because he uses an alias. I said something to the effect that I admire his imagination and creativity but that I felt that he had a tendency to focus to0 much on making each phrase “interesting” to the detriment of the overall structure of the piece.
Apparently I ruffled his feathers because he went on to respond with a list of attributes, which he considers encapsulate great pianism and that I’m simply not aware of the the niceties of all of his myriad of shadings and that I need a good instructor who could explain them to me.
Lol. Yeah, I thought that he was gifted and eccentric enough that someone would find that appealing and try to promote his career.
Bozhanov’s playing at the 2010 Chopin competition made a titanic impression on me. I still think it’s among the most impressive playing I’ve heard from any pianist of his generation.
However… I explored what he’s been up to since a little more thoroughly last year, and thereby found the answer to your question. There was still some good playing there, but it wasn’t like in the CC, and a lot of it felt experimental and interpretatively unfinished. Da xsdc psychologist fear he’s an example of what happens to a young talent who puts everything in there, but doesn’t get much back from the world. He loses confidence and motivation. This is why I’m so eager Noack, Tyson & Co who are in the same position today really get their names out there.
haha amazing he lectured you. Which channel is that? One guy who I’m pretty sure runs (one of) the Bozhanov channels emailed me and asked if I want to host one of B’s recordings, and I said yeah of course I love him. After hearing this I wonder if that was B. in disguise.
I thought his career was going well but I haven’t heard much of him in the past 2 years.
chagrisFR is the channel.
Yeah that was him. My thought was that a sincere fan runs that channel. Are you sure it’s B?
Funnily enough just yesterday I removed his channel from my YT public playlist so I could add Laura Rozada.
Maybe it wasn’t B. However, it was a bullet point list of very detailed explications of what he was trying to achieve. If it was a fan, the fan must be a pianist, as well. Also, I remember the lesson started with “I normally don’t reply to such comments…”
You still have this?
Right on. I checked my messages and it actually came from a different channel. For some reason I’ve linked them, maybe for a reason I can’t recall.
I’ve uplaoded a few of his Chopin recordings from 2015 where he takes big liberties, especially in the Barcarolle. Great public response to them though.
Well I hope this isn’t the case.
I think in today’s social media age it’s way easier to keep yourself in people’s consciousness through things like twitter and instagram.
I pretty much see posts or stories from Rana, Levit etc everyday.
You can’t just upload your stuff on youtube anymore and hope people notice, it’s not like the old days where the only piano video was some chick battling her way through the third movement of Rach 2 at 1/4 pace.
I don’t. I felt weird about the whole situation, so I apologized if I offended him and deleted the comment linked to his reply.
It’s definitely his channel. His professional website links to it. Also, interestingly, his promoter/manager in Germany also manages Pogo.
No I guess that’s true. Pity things never did take off though, I think he was seriously impressive.
In case someone isn’t aware of his CC spectacle, below is the small essay I’ve written on the subject in my list, mostly as a memory note to self.
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- Also an audio copy. Bozhanov received an average rank of 3.92 in the final verdict and finished 4th. Avdeeva took the gold at 1.47, Wunder and Geniušas shared silver at 2.48 and 2.50 respectively, and Trifonov bronze at 3.48. Miroslav Kultyshev, who participated too, finished 6th behind François Dumont and was given a distinction award. Argerich positioned Bozhanov shared 2nd with Geniušas (Avdeeva and Trifonov shared first), while Freire put Bozhanov at shared 2nd with Avdeeva (Trifonov alone at the top).
This was both one of the toughest and one of the most controversial editions in the history of the competition. After the solo rounds a clear leader group had formed among the audience consisting of Daniil Trifonov, Evgeni Bozhanov, Ingolf Wunder and Lukas Geniušas. Bozhanov was at second place prior to the finals, closely behind Avdeeva, but opinion of him was widely spread among the judges. Shortly prior to the final round the jury introduced a last minute rule change where the importance of the points acquired in Stages I-III was dramatically reduced, since some jurors felt the pre-existing system “risked ranking some pianists too highly” (according to Harasiewicz in a post-competition interview). This strongly disfavored Bozhanov who had his strength in the solo rounds, and helped secure the gold for Avdeeva - to the surprise of the audience to whom she came from way out on left field. Bozhanov felt unfairly treated by the rule change which as he saw it had been to clear him from the medal positions and refused to appear at the awards ceremony and closing gala concerts, thereby forfeiting his prize money. Further controversy was sparked a week later when Fou Ts’ong who sat in the jury acknowledged in an interview with the China Times that Avdeeva had been his protégé for 2.5 years, referring to her both as his student and spiritual heir and showing strong bias for her success in the competition. Jurors are not allowed to vote on students or relatives, but Fou had failed to declare his connection with her, and had given her near perfect scores during the solo stages and even saved her from elimination during the preliminaries by threatening to withdraw if she wasn’t allowed to continue. The committee launched an investigation upon the publication of the interview where it was eventually decided their connection was loose enough not to warrant any action, but rules and checks were tightened ahead of the next edition of the competition.
Someone wanna make the same comment and see if he’ll take the bait?
I didn’t follow that edition, but randomly I actually like Avdeeva’s playing in general.
That rule change is complet BS though, as is Tsong’s bias.
I also have to admit it hurts a bit that my favourite Freire would vote for Trifonov!
Man that is communist-level bullshit.
I didn’t know about this one. Thanks. That’s complete BS. Of course the CC committee will behave the same way as the Olympic committee when it comes to something like this. I have not listened to Avdeeva extensively but I’ve not heard anything of interest in her playing. Damn that competition was crooked.
Invite him to daSDC next time, it sounds like he will just fit in here. 
Da Bossa Nova is a legend for ding his piano competition world tour (Richter competition, Elisabeth competition, Chopin competition, Cliburn competition in a short time span)
Randomly, in every one of competitions he was the best finalist but he never got awarded first prize. Should have given his tuition money to da Kaplinsky. 
I must add that this section above was marked in red in my list, meaning it’s only visible to me, which could indicate I didn’t trust the source I took it from. Or maybe just that I felt it was too rough on Ts’ong to have in there.
Either way, raur - I was going to write this as well last night but was just too tired to put it in text. I’m not surprised. Competitions rarely let forth pianists who represent something new or who think outside the box since they will sound alien if you have a fixed idea of how a certain composer “should” be played. When it’s happened it’s actually normally when a significant proportion of “great” pianists themselves have been in the jury. Note that both Argerich and Freire here for instance did recognize what EB did, while most of the lesser names on the panel did not. I think it’s at least in part because of some misplaced sense of responsibility, to think that this guy might be great but we can’t let such a weirdo win our Distinguished Piano Competition. In this edition of the CC Avdeeva was the safe choice, but I knew very early on that she wouldn’t survive out in the wild.