Sonja Šarić, first prize winner and audience's choice award winner of the 4th Éva Marton International Singing Competition, says that great friendships have been formed between the performers and she is certain that this victory is a big step in her career.

A defining figure, a head of department who has just resigned his post, bade farewell in a special birthday concert. Kálmán Dráfi represents the oldest traditions of the Liszt Academy, the Liszt–Cziffra line, and has mentored a string of exceptional young musicians who are among the greatest stars on the Hungarian and international musical scenes. As a pianist, he still plays with the same intensity, elegance and emotionality as ever, something that makes him unique in the world today and has earned him success, competition awards and (now rare) concert recordings since his youth.

Beethoven was born 250 years ago. To mark the approaching anniversary, we asked musicologist Sándor Kovács, head of the Doctoral School of the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, to give us a truthful and detailed portrait of Beethoven, most often described in anecdotes as morose and deaf.

In May 1799, Baroness Anna Seeberg and her daughters left Budapest for Vienna to take piano lessons from Ludwig van Beethoven, the 29-year-old up-and-coming artist of the day. The innocent trip resulted in lifelong friendships and a fatal love affair. Dr Judith Bajzáth, head of the visitors centre at the Agricultural Research Centre, talks about the details.

With top awards from over 20 international piano competitions to his credit,  Russian-born Alexandre Moutouzkine, who now lives and teaches in New York and is a member of the jury for the competition, will contribute to the decision on which young talent is to be the winner. A lecturer at the Manhattan School of Music, he admits that discovering Bartók’s universe is an experience beyond description to a performing artist.