the official blog of the Percussive Arts Society

In March, KoSA Music's international participants ranging in age from 22–70 years young had a chance to study with some of Cuba's best artists, such as Oliver Valdes (drum set), Panga (congas), Adel Gonzales (congas and timbales), El Peje (drum set), Dyron (conga and timbales), Roelvis Reyez (drum set), and Dr. Olavo Alen Rodriguez (ethnomusicologist). Dr. Olavo's seminar on the history of Cuban music and culture was a real eye-opener to many first-time participants visiting this beautiful island, and KoSA's organized walking tours of historic centers of Havana further contextualized this fascinating history. 

Besides intimate hands-on classes, attendees were able to soak up the sounds of the talented artists featured in the evening concerts of the Fiesta del Tambor (The Havana Rhythm & Dance Festival). The esteemed artists featured this year included Los Munequitos de Matanzas, Anthony Bravo, Brenda Navarrete y su grupo, and Compania JJ. 

A highlight of the week was the special Sabian/Gon Bops night, which featured many of Cuba's top drummers and percussionists.

Other concerts throughout the week were The Drummers of Burundi, the National Competition winners, Grupo Mas con Menos, Giraldo Piloto & Klimax, Yordys Larrazabat Y Lele Van Van, Maraton Rumbero, Ronald Y Explosion Rumbera, Orquestra Manolito Simonet y Su Trabajo, Alexander Abreu y Habana De Primera, Osain del Monte, and Mykel Blanco Y Salsa Mayor. 

Two contests organized by Italy PAS from September to December 2022 drew 450 registered participants from 40 countries around the world and resulted in 110 winners. It took three months of work to assign the prize:s for the 19th edition of the Italy Percussion Competition (for soloists and composers) and for the 6th edition of the Percussion Arts Web Contest (from Duo to Ensemble). This event, which was organized by Antonio Santangelo (President of PAS Italy) and Claudio Santangelo (Artistic Director), is considered one of the most important worldwide. Everyone recognizes the great work and great organization of PAS Italy, which will celebrate 20 years of activity in September 2023. 

According to Santangelo, “It was hard work on our part and on the part of all the artists in the Jury to identify the winners for the high level of execution. Here we listened to future talents, and as Katarzyna Mycka pointed out, ‘It was a really big group of mostly very talented young musicians. Especially the youngest group is very impressive!”

These are the 17 artists who formed the five juries and decided the winners:

MARIMBA
Jury: N. Jovan Živković (Serbia), Katarzyna Mycka (Poland), Denis Petrunin (Russia).
Category A. 1st prize: Guoer Pang (China); 2nd prize: Hanna Piao (China), Bárbara Ribeiro (Portugal), Ziyi Liu (China), Sheng-Che Lin (Taiwan); 3rd prize: Fung Lut Kwan Rani (Hong Kong), Ni Xiang, Yi Chung Chen (Taiwan), Edgars Zaurs (Latvia), Suah Park (Korea)
Category B. 1st prize: Sora Wakasaki (Japan), 2nd prize: Chia Yu Lin (Taiwan), Sheng-Yuan Wang (Taiwan), Xingyue Xue (China), 3rd prize: Péter Kiss (Hungary), Chuling Ye (China)
Category C. 1st prize: Tanel-Eiko Novikov (Estonia); 2nd prize: Rio Nitta (Japan); 3rd prize: Ako Hibi (Japan), Wan-Yun Teng, Yun-Han Lee (Taiwan)

VIBRAPHONE (classic and jazz) 
Jury: Victor Mendoza (Mexico), Alexey Chizhick (Russia), Pierpaolo Bisogno (Italy).
Category A. 1st prize: Fabian Czajka (Poland); 2nd prize: David Stecher (Austria), Vinzent Dienz (Austria); Piotr Styczynski (Poland), Michał Rąpała (Poland), Clara Plantamura (Italy); 3rd prize: Lorenzo Parillo (Italy), Bartolomeo P. Fiorillo, Davide Di Marino, Gennaro Basile (Italy).
Category B. 1st prize: Christian Del Bianco (Italy); 2nd prize: Martin Descamps (Belgium), Riccardo Manco (Italy); 3rd prize: András Simon (Hungary), Xiyang Li (China), Johannes Claassen (Germany)
Category C. 1st prize: Yun-Han Lee (Taiwan), Yasuaki Fukuhara (Japan); 2nd prize: Nadia Mikołajczyk (Poland); 3rd prize: Tomomi Nozaki (Japan)
Category J 1st prize: abs. Vid Jamnik (Slovenia); 2nd prize: Rogério Filipe Rodrigues Francisco (Portugal), Boerner Ismael (France); Michele Sannelli (Italy), Johannes Claassen (Germany); 3rd prize: Szu-Ya Wang (Taiwan)

TIMPANI
Jury: John H. Beck (USA), Nick Woud (Holland), Claudio Romano (Italy).
Category A. 1st prize: Not assigned; 2nd prize: Benjamin Mohácsi (Hungary); 3rd prize: Ede Czilik (Hungary), Boldizsar Kovacs (Hungary)
Category B. 1st Prize: Spiro Tzafestas (Greece); 2nd prize: Marcell Magyar (Hungary); 3rd prize: Łucja Zahorska (Poland), Yuzhi Hu (China)
Category C. 1st prize: Not assigned; 2nd prize: Gabriel Rodriguez (Argentina); 3rd prize: Yun-Han Lee (Taiwan)

SNARE DRUM
Jury: Fernando Hashimoto (Brazil), Peter Vulperhorst (Holland), Norbert Rabanser (Austria).
Category A. 1st prize: Benjamin Mohácsi (Hungary); 2nd prize: Hannes Vonmetz (Italy), Lukas Wörter (Austria), Márton Sábli (Hungary), Samuel W. Gosálbez (Spain), Guoer Pang (China); 3rd prize: Jakob N. Mancinelli (Italy), SiQi Liu, Yunni Fu, Ziyi Liu (China)
Category B. 1st prize: Spiro Tzafestas (Greece); 2nd prize: Jonas Zink (Austria), Tristan Vauth (France), Borja Esteban Ortega (Spain); 3rd prize: Masaki Karino, Yuya Homma, Rakuto Sembogi (Japan)
Category C. 1st prize: Balazs Laczko-Peto (Hungary); 2nd prize: Masaharu Nagano (Japan); 3rd prize: Kinga Kazimierska (Poland)

COMPOSITION
Jury: John Psathas (New Zeland), Ruud Wiener (Holland), Todd Ukena and Richard LeVan (USA), Claudio Santangelo (Italy). 
Category A. 3rd Prize: Francesco Sgambati (Italy) 
Category B. Not assigned
Category C. 2nd Prize: Kai Stensgaard (Denmark), De Martino Agustin Ivan (Argentina)
Category D. 3rd Prize: Wenchi Tsai (Taiwan)
Category E. 2nd Prize: Wang Szu-Ya (Taiwan); 3rd Prize: Greg A Steinke (USA)

PERCUSSIVE ARTS WEB CONTEST (PAWC) 
Jury: Gordon Stout and W. Lee Vinson (USA), Naoko Takada and Nino Masayuki (Japan), She-e Wu and Pei-Ching Wu (Taiwan), Jeanni Zhang and Jingjing Li (China), JiHye Jung and Sam Um (Korea), Frederic Macarez (France), Dennis Kuhn and Nils Rohwer (Germany), Walter Mertens (Belgium), Luigi Morleo, Tarcisio Molinaro, Maria Vittorio, Luigi Marinaro, Francesca Santangelo (Italy).
Category A/DUO (Percussion solo). 1st prize: Amadeusz Franczyk and You-Ting Chung; 2nd prize: Jiaen Zheng and Siyu Zhou
Category B/DUO (Percussion and Piano). 1st prize: Viviana Garbetta (mar.) and Ruggiero Morelli (pf)
Category C/DUO (Percussion with other instruments). 1st prize: Mei-Shyuan Chiu (mar.) and Matt Fox (sax); 1st place: Hynwoo Kim (mar.) and Ethan Oh (cello)
Category D/ENSEMBLE (3 to 6 percussionists). 1st prize: Trio Liu Ziyi, Yang QinRan, Yan HaoZhe; 2nd prize: Quintet Trey Clark, Cory Doran, Michael Jones, Nicole Robbins, Andrew Velt; 2nd prize: Quartet Liu ZiYi, Liu SiQi, Yan HaoZhe, Wang JiaCheng
Category E/ENSEMBLE (middle and secondary schools with musical orientation). 1st prize: abs. China/Percussion Ensemble – 8 Payers Prof. Jingli Zhang and Dongliang Xu; 1st prize: Hong Kong/Percussion Ensemble – 8 Payers Initial - P - Studio Percussion Ensemble/Prof. Li Ka Wai; 2nd prize: Italy/Percussion Ensemble – 5 Payers Liceo Musicale Statale “G. Verga” of Modica (Sicily) Prof. G. Valente

The Percussion Arts Web Contest cash prizes of € 8.000# were donated by Italy PAS, and the instrument prizes of the Italy Percussion Competition were donated by Adams, Bergerault, APinstrument, Pustiens Percussion P., Angelini Mallets for a total of €15.000#. The compositions will be published by HoneyRock. 

BRAZIL
The Percussion Group of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro School of Music (EM-UFRJ), under the direction of Dr. Pedro Sá, presented a world premiere on Oct. 31, 2022 in Rio de Janeiro, as part of the event Panorama of Current Brazilian Music, at the Leopoldo Miguez Hall of the UFRJ School of Music. The piece premiered was “Jongada Fantástica,” written by Filipe de Matos Rocha. This challenging and engaging work was scored for drums of jongo rhythm, one of the "fathers of samba," including candongueiro (high drum), caxambu (middle drum), and tambu (low drum), along with marimba, glockenspiel, vibraphone, and other percussion instruments. Under the direction of its Director, Professor Dr. Pedro Sá, the members of the percussion group were Rafael de Oliveira, Nathan Medeiros, Railson Marques, Cleyton Newman, Matheus Santos, Johnny Rodrigues, and Eliezer Macedo, all students of the BA in Percussion at EM-UFRJ.