Since 1998, the Dr Hermann Büttner Piano Competition has been organised annually by the lawyer named after him. Since 2017, the renowned competition to promote young musicians has been organised by the Adler Büttner Foundation.
This year's competition was for solo piano. In the first round, a work by Johann Sebastian Bach was obligatory: namely an English or French Suite, or the French Overture BWV 831 or the Capriccio in B flat major sopra la lontananza del suo fratello dilettissimo BWV 992 and a work by a female composer lasting around 5 minutes. In the second round, the Bach movements not played in the first round and works of free choice were to be performed. Twelve candidates had registered for the first round; ten actually took part. Of these ten pianists, five made it through to the second round, three of whom were ultimately awarded prizes and will play part of their programme from the second round at the prizewinners' concert, which will take place on Friday 4 July at 7.30 pm in the Velte Hall at Gottesaue Castle.
A third prize and prize money totalling 2,000 euros will be awarded to Han Ni, who will play Maurice Ravel's ‘Miroirs’ at the prizewinners' concert. No second prize was awarded as two pianists performed at the same very high level. They will each receive a first prize and prize money totalling 7,000 euros: Zhongzhi Sun will perform the Piano Sonata, Sz. 80 by Béla Bartók and ‘Triana’ from the suite ‘Iberia’ by Isaac Albéniz in the prizewinners' concert; Tai-Wei Huang will play the Piano Sonata No. 3 by Johannes Brahms. All three prizewinners come from the class of Prof Roberto Domingos.
The jury, chaired by Dr Hermann Büttner, consisted exclusively of experts who are not members of the Karlsruhe University of Music: the pianist and NDR journalist Annette Yang, the Italian pianist Prof. Irene Russo (Trieste) and Klaus Sticken, piano professor at the Music and Arts Private University of the City of Vienna.