Masaya Kamei 'Feels The Melody' In Cliburn Audition

Arlington TX

11 March, 2022

5:54 PM

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By Marcheta Fornoff, Fort Worth Report March 10, 2022 As a toddler, Masaya Kamei preferred plunking around on a keyboard to playing outside. Toddlers will bang on keys, but Kamei's mom noticed that it wasn't just noise, he was playing the melody of a song they'd recently heard.After that, his mom bought a piano. Now 20, Kamei is hoping that he'll get to compete for a medal at this summer's Sixteenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. When he first took the stage at PepsiCo Recital Hall he was a little bit nervous and cold, Kamei said, but he settled in quickly. He breezed through two compositions from Liszt, and afterward estimated that he was able to show off 90% of his full ability on the keys. For Kamei playing comes naturally. "Piano is like eating, like sleeping," he said. "I feel the melody or music more than thinking (about it)." Anton Nel, a former winner of the Naumburg International Piano Competition, is a member of the jury at the screening auditions that will decide which pianists advance to the next round. "I assume that everybody who's playing here is going to be excellent," Nel said of the current crop of contestants. "But sometimes, when you least expect it — and this is part of the magic of what music really is and what keeps me at it every day — you get touched when you least expect it or you get moved by a performance, and that's special. So, I wait for those moments." To read the full article, click here. Fort Worth Report is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that produces factual, in-depth journalism about city and county government, schools, healthcare, business, and arts and culture in Tarrant County. Always free to read; subscribe to newsletters, read coverage or support our newsroom at fortworthreport.org.