The Many Stories of Bill Fitzpatrick: Playing Sibelius in a competition

In a competition in Texas I started by playing some Bach, a movement of a Beethoven sonata, a Paganini caprice and the first movement of the Sibelius concerto. Before beginning the Sibelius one of the juror members asked me if I could please start from the B flat just before the cadenza. I did but I really did not understand why he asked for that starting point but of course that is where I started. While I was playing, I suddenly understood... He was hoping that I would play the octaves passage at the end of the movement out of tune and so would then be eliminated. Well, that's what happened and I waited around to hear the results anyway. After the results announcement came I was silently furious and went back to my hotel room and practiced those octaves for what must have been 4 hours. Finally, I looked into the mirror and told myself ... don't you ever let that happen again...

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