Last Monday at Walk Festival Hall in Teton Village, saxophonist Nickoli Kumm, of Cody High School, held the small but supportive audience rapt with his performance of French composer Paule Maurice’s “Tableaux de Provence.”
Tyler McKay, from Madison High School in Rexburg, Idaho, wowed the 70 or so listeners with a knuckle-busting 20-minute showcase of solo piano works by Haydn, Ravel and Scriabin.
But by the end of the short evening program, it was Emily Goldner-Morgan, from Timberlake High School in Athol, Idaho, who rose to the top, applying her bel canto and coloratura vocal skills to music by Donizetti, Offenbach, Grieg and Haydn and taking home $25,000 in scholarship money, the first prize in the sixth annual Donald Runnicles Musical Arts Scholarship Competition.
McKay was named winner of the second prize, worth $15,000 to further his music education, and Kumm walked away with the $10,000 third-place prize.
“This is as good as it gets,” Sir Donald Runnicles, director of the Grand Teton Music Festival for whom the competition was named and one of the three judges in the house, said after the three finalists had performed. “The level of artistry is so remarkable. Comparisons are always odious, but a competition is a competition.”
In naming Kumm the third-place finalist, Runnicles lauded his selection, a post-impressionist suite with five movements that varied from dreamy contemplation to spritely playfulness.
“I never would have thought this type of piece would feature in this kind of competition,” said Runnicles, who also commented on Kumm’s passionate drive to see his instrument better represented in classical music.
He then raved about McKay’s virtuosic performance, suggesting that had he been paid by the note he would surely have taken home a bundle: “I’m very impressed by this young man,” he said.
At which point, Goldner-Morgan understood that she was about to be crowned this year’s winner and struggled to contain her emotions.
“Scary stuff,” Runnicles said of her selections: an aria from Donizetti’s opera “La Zingara”; “Les oiseaux dans la charmille” from Offenbach’s “Les Contes d’Hoffmann”; Grieg’s “Solveigs Lied” from his “Peer Gynt” suite; and “With Verdure Clad” from Haydn’s oratorio “The Creation.”
“It’s scary at sea level,” he said, “let alone at 6,500 feet. To embrace this repertoire is courageous and ambitious.”
Following up over the weekend, Runnicles reiterated how difficult it was to rank the three musicians’ skills, but said it came down to “having a glimpse of where this young person may be in three, four, five years from now.”
“You have to recognize talent, you have to recognize virtuosity, but you also have to listen carefully for a unique voice,” he said.
And while many teenage musicians may have notched 10 or more years on their instruments, a young soprano like Goldner-Morgan, whose instrument is her still-growing body, does not have that advantage.
“Emily was just extraordinary,” said Runnicles, who has through his career conducted great swaths of the opera repertoire.
Monday evening’s round was actually the second time the three finalists had presented their programs that day. In the morning they squared off in the competition’s semifinals with pianist Laine Lund from Tech Trep Academy in Freedom, flutist Ella Horton, flute, from Meridian High School in Meridian, Idaho, and flutist Kenna Patterson from Emmett High School in Emmett, Idaho. They had been chosen from a large pool of high school seniors from Wyoming, Idaho and Montana who had submitted entries to the competition in April.
The Runnicles Scholarship is funded by anonymous Grand Teton Music Festival supporters. In addition to Runnicles, the day’s judges were clarinetist Stephanie Key, a 19-year GTMF veteran from the Dallas Symphony, and violist Chiara Kingsley Dieguez, of the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra, who has performed with the festival for 20 years. Pianist Brock Tjosvold did yeoman’s service accompanying Kumm and Goldner-Morgan through their difficult programs.
