侄女因从中部飞来本地参加一个国际钢琴比赛,让我当了一回星妈.

上次见她还是二十年前, 我暑假回家,堂兄一家三口来杭州玩. 因四五岁光景,白净可爱, 刚开始学琴.见她有空就拿出一长白纸条,上面画满了黑白键盘. 她胖呼呼的小手指在纸条上跳来跳去,练习弹钢琴.以后的二十年里,我随大流地完成了从女学生到中年妇女的转变, 不时听到关于因的消息; 因考上上音附小了, 出国比赛了,进了音乐学院了….拿到奖学金来美国了.

终于见到因了. 接下来的一个多星期,我喜孜孜地开车送她去抽签, 去练琴,去比赛. 第一轮的比赛她抽在第二天. 我陪她去看了第一天的比赛. 我外行一个地坐在那儿,只觉得个个都弹得不错. 因笑嘻嘻地说怎么都弹得比我好? 我紧张起来,马上说那我们不看了, 回家吧. 因第二天比赛的时候,我什么忙也帮不上.在后台的门口等她, 见她出来了,也不知该说什么,缺乏做星妈的经验啊! 因反而安慰我说弹完了,没弹错.

第一轮的比赛还有第三天,可我要上班去了. 中午吃饭时,因来电话,说她进了第二轮,37人有11人进二轮. 隔天送因去州立大学的琴房练了整一天. 比赛那天,我提前下班,匆匆赶去, 一进门就看见电视屏上因在弹琴,原来正好轮到她. 我看不出好坏,就径直去后台门口等,不一会儿她出来了,笑笑说又完成任务乐. 但中间有弹错. 我心一沉, 连忙说没事, 周末和妹妹们去海边玩吧. 后面还有两位选手,等他们弹完, 我们就开始等评委会讨论,然后宣布进决赛的名单. 等待的时候,不时有听众来和因说多么喜欢她的演奏,有位小年轻跑来说我觉得你弹得最好,应该进前三. 我听了满心欢喜, 但一想到老美的甜嘴,我又警惕地看着小年轻的背影,看他有没有又去和别的选手套近乎.不一会儿又过来俩水暖工模样的人, 夸奖因的弹奏, 说很独特(unique). 我听了又高兴起来, 而后我百无聊赖,翻翻手中的比赛手册,发现水暖工之一原来还是比赛的董事会主席.心如过山车般上下了几回,评委终于露面了.  首先宣布的是鼓励奖,二人中选,没有因. 而后宣布进决赛的三人, 有因和两位帅哥.

决赛是和交响乐团合作的. 因最后得第三. 评委主席告诉说因在决赛中弹得最好,但名次是看三轮比赛的总成绩. 我没有去看决赛现场, 这里转贴我们当地报纸的评论吧,显然记者是偏爱因的

First up was Tomer Gewirtzman, 18, from Haifa, Israel, currently studying at the Buchman-Mehta Academy of Music in Tel Aviv. He\'s tall and skinny, and, just by walking onstage, shyly charismatic, gave a sense of the way he plays: with power, but also a dreamy side, holding something in reserve.

He played Rachmaninoff\'s Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, a torrential finger-buster. He is a huge talent: long fingers plying liquid interludes, with a chiming cadenza driving down to leather-punched bass notes, then shimmery trills in the treble. Yet, he seemed a couple of years away from storming the world; his emotional and technical palette needs more shades of color.

For me, the goose-bumps began when Chaoyin Cai, 24, from China and now studying at the Cleveland Institute of Music, peeled the opening chords to Rachmaninoff\'s Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor: power and beauty! This was conversational playing, at home with the music, and extraordinarily accomplished: many colors and shades, with every phrase beautifully shaped.

She played satin textures or shifted from a whisper to a shout, singing Rachmaninoff\'s big songs. It was electric: She controlled the performance\'s temperature, partnering with the orchestra, which sounded lush and inspired - and, at times, carried away, too loud, drowning out some of Cai\'s passages. Still, I couldn\'t imagine the night getting much better.

For me, as it turns out, it had reached its pinnacle. Not that the final performer, 22-year-old Christopher Falzone, a Philadelphian studying at the Curtis Institute of Music, is some kind of slouch.

He was technically brilliant, mowing down Tchaikovsky\'s billion-noted Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor: those crashing, opening chords, bounding up across six-plus octaves; those flying double-octaves in the cadenza. He nailed all of it, but nailing it seemed the objective: The performance felt too screwed-down.

As he moved toward the finish, I thought, \"This is a no-brainer. Cai takes the gold, followed by Gewirtzman, then Falzone.\"

Then Falzone brought Tchaikovsky to a thundering finish and the audience burst into the night\'s biggest ovation.

Clearly, I was in the minority - and, half an hour later, on a ledge.

Out marched the judges, led by jury president Antonio Pompa-Baldi of the Cleveland Institute, who explained that their decisions were based on the night\'s performances as well as two earlier rounds of solo performances. It had been unanimous, he said,