Competition schedule
The 66th Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition will take place as follows:
⋅ Applications open from 13 February to 14 May 2026
⋅ Glocal Piano Festival: November 2026
⋅ Finals: 25 August – 5 September 2027
Frequently Asked Questions
The Glocal Piano Festival is the second round of selections of the Busoni Competition, developed as a truly international, multi-venue festival.
The Glocal takes place across 10 leading concert venues in Asia, Europe and the United States, where pianists perform their own choice of repertoire in front of a live audience.
To qualify for the finals of the Busoni Competition in Bolzano in 2027, candidates may be selected either by the professional jury, who will follow the Glocal Piano Festival performances remotely, or by the live audience, who will be asked to vote for their favourite artist at the end of each concert.
You must complete the online form, which includes the audition video and payment of the €40 registration fee (to be paid by credit card directly via the online form). Once the registration form has been submitted, the jury will select 120 candidates who will be invited to perform at the Glocal Piano Festival.
You can find the registration form at this link: https://application.busoni-mahler.eu/
No, the location will be allocated to you by the Organisers of the Competition.
A three-person jury will watch all the videos and read the short biography you submit, and will select 120 pianists to proceed to the next round: the Glocal Piano Festival.
- You may only upload a single video
- The video must be between 12 and 16 minutes long
- Maximum file size: 5 GB (a 15-minute video in Full HD is approximately 1 GB)
- Video format required: MP4
- The recording must be of good technical quality, preferably a professional recording
- The video must be filmed using a single camera from a fixed position, without any cuts whilst performing a single piece
- If you are playing two or more pieces, you may record them separately (each piece filmed in a single take) and then merge them into a single video file
- The video must have been made within 24 months prior to the application for admission
- The recording must not be edited. Do not include titles, fades or video transitions.
- Recordings of rehearsals or rounds from other competitions are permitted, provided they include a statement from the respective organisers confirming that no manipulations or modifications have been made to the audio. Competition videos may include cuts and titles
- Only complete works will be accepted. “Complete work” refers to individual études, interludes or pieces that are, in normal concert practice, performed outside the compositional cycle; individual movements of sonatas or suites are not permitted.
The programme for the pre-selection video must include:
- An etude by F. Chopin (Op. 10 or Op. 25) or an etude by F. Liszt.
- One Étude by one of the following composers: C. Debussy, B. Bartók (Op. 18), S. Rachmaninov, S. Prokofiev, I. Stravinsky, A. Scriabin or G. Ligeti.
- One or more pieces chosen by the candidate that fall within the permitted time limit.
The term ‘complete works’ refers to the performance of a musical work in its entirety; it is therefore not possible to submit individual movements of a piece (such as individual movements of a sonata or individual parts of a suite).
Exceptions are made only if it is common practice in concert performance to perform these parts individually. For example, it is possible to perform Ravel’s Scarbo from Gaspard de la Nuit as a standalone piece.
If you wish to apply as a winner of a WFIMC competition, you will need to wait until 1 July 2026. At that point, we will publish a specific application form for you to use. You will need to complete a form with your personal details and information about your studies, your biography, the certificate for the prize you have won, one or more videos (preferably those from the other competition in which you won the prize) and the musical programme for the final.
You will have until 31 October 2026 to submit your application. Please bear in mind that we receive a large number of applications from WFIMC prize winners and that only 3 of these are admitted to the finals. It is therefore not guaranteed that you will make it through to the finals.
The Busoni Competition supports the launch of the first edition of the Cape Piano International Piano Competition: all registered participants of the Busoni Competition who enter the Cape Piano will receive a discount on the participation fee. Find all the details here: https://capepiano.com/