Articles

A week after the final, who is your biggest Malko hero? My Malko hero is the person responsible for the competition’s biggest and most invaluable prize: the gift of experiencing live orchestral music for the first time.

All twelve of today’s candidates can leave the concert hall with their heads held high. But their approaches were fascinatingly different.

It’s in the nature of knockout competitions that you don’t always agree with the jury’s verdict.

In its current incarnation, the Malko Competition exists to launch a career. So we have to consider who is its worthiest winner.

The evening’s best conductor won. Ryan Bancroft gave us an involving and at times commanding performance of the first movement of Brahms’s Second Symphony in Copenhagen this evening, and has walked off with the 2018 Malko Competition First Prize as a result. 

After a record number of applicants, there’s some serious talent among 2018’s chosen Malko Competition finalists.