Youngsters scale musical heights...

May 10 2008 South Wales Echo

THE five finalists have been named and the nerve-wracking countdown has begun to find out who will be the BBC Young Musician of the Year in the competition's 30th anniversary year. Mike Smith gives us the lowdown on the competition.

YOU could call it junior X Factor for the world of classical music instead of pop – but there’s no doubting it’s big.

BBC Young Musician of the Year, one of the world's greatest music competitions, has been transformed for this 30th anniversary celebratory year into a grand final weekend extravaganza at Wales Millennium Centre.

Celebrity presenters including Strictly Come Dancing star Gethin Jones and singer and broadcaster Aled Jones will not only be joined by the WMC audience but TV, radio and online viewers and listeners eager to find out which of the five lads from around the UK will be crowned the winner.

The final takes the form of two concerts, tonight and tomorrow afternoon and both will combine live performances with video footage of the lads' journey from last year’s auditions to this weekend's final.

There is a chance the competition will produce its youngest ever winner as the finalists include 12-year-old trombonist Peter Moore, who is a few months younger than Jennifer Pike was when she won the 1989 competition, and who started playing the instrument aged just six.

The other contestants are all aged 17 and 18 and all have already become well-known to TV audiences this week as each finalist has been revealed in a series of BBC Four programmes. One of the five will follow in the footsteps of past winners such as Nicola Benedetti,Jennifer Pike, Emma Johnson and 2006 winner clarinetist Mark Simpson.

Nicola Benedetti, who won a classical Brit Award on Thursday night, will be at WMC for the finals tonight as one of the judges, as will Wales' superstar harpist Catrin Finch.

While no Welsh youngsters have made it through to the final, 18-year-old pianist Erdem Misirlioglu has a strong Welsh backing as his mum Julia is from Newbridge.

Tonight each of the five finalists will play their chosen concerto with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Principal Conductor Thierry Fischer, in front of the judging panel and a live audience.

The competitors will return to the stage tomorrow, to reprise a part of their concerto performance, chosen by the judges after tonight's concert, as well as performing a piece that is personal to them.