Woodwind Final BBC Young Musician

28 years ago, an 18-year-old clarinettist gave a life-changing

performance to win the fourth BBC Young Musician title.

Today Emma Johnson is one of the world's leading soloists

and she's back with us tonight as a member of our jury.

Hoping to impress her, five young performers with dreams

of following in her footsteps.

We're now just over a week away from the final

of BBC Young Musician 2012.

By the end of next Friday's programme,

we'll know the full line-up for the semi-final.

And it's shaping up to be quite the battle.

Already through, 15-year-old pianist Yuanfan Yang,

who took the keyboard title with a spectacular performance.

APPLAUSE

16-year-old bass trombonist Alex Kelly triumphed

in an emotional brass final.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

And the strings gave the jury a tough night.

But in the end 14-year-old cellist Laura Van Der Heijden

lifted the trophy.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Tonight it's the turn of the woodwinds, as five more

young performers take the stage

here at the Royal Welsh College Of Music And Drama, in Cardiff.

It promises to be another night of compelling performance

and nail-biting competition.

And no wonder...

There's a lot a stake.

It really does open doors for people.

It's a really big thing, a very special thing, a unique opportunity.

It gives an opportunity they can't possibly have anywhere else.

I remember watching, thinking, "Yeah, wouldn't it be great to do that?"

The exposure provides many things.

It's a great start to your professional career.

Probably the most important contest in the world for young people.

It helps you understand what performance is.

You have to get every note to your highest possible standard.

My life has been changed.

It's a very important competition.

I wouldn't be here right now if I hadn't won it. It's amazing.

If you've been following the series so far, you'll know that

BBC Young Musician 2012 looks set to be another vintage year.

Tonight we have no fewer than five woodwind instruments represented -

the bassoon, the clarinet, the flute, the saxophone

and, for only the third time in the competition's history,

we'll hear a recorder in the category finals.

In just a few moments we'll be meeting our five finalists,

but first, a reminder of how they got here

and what lies ahead for the winner.

Over 450 young musicians applied,

but only 25 have made it to this stage, the category finals.

That's five in each category...

brass...

woodwind...

strings...

keyboard...

and percussion.

The winner of each category will then compete in the semi-final,

at stake just three places in the final.

A week on Sunday, we'll see our three finalists take to the stage

at one of the UK's finest concert halls, the Sage Gateshead.

They'll each perform a full concerto with the Northern Sinfonia,

led by one of the most exciting conductors of his generation -

Kirill Karibits.

That takes place over on BBC2 on 13th May,

and I very much hope you'll join me there.

Meanwhile, back to the task at hand.

It's time to meet our five woodwind finalists,

each of them hoping for a shot at the title BBC Young Musician 2012.

First on, Charlotte Barbour-Condini, aged 15,

a recorder player from London.

I haven't really thought about winning this.

If I do get through I'll be very happy.

I'll be very... I'll be shocked.

It's just a great thing to be part of.

I'm definitely looking forward to it.

19-year-old clarinettist Jordan Black, from Swindon.

Tonight I just want to really enjoy it, not think too much about,

you know, that it's a competition. It is a competition, but I just want

to really enjoy myself and really communicate to the audience.

I mean, it's been such an exciting journey,

I'm really happy to be here.

Next, from Staffordshire, 17-year-old saxophonist

Lucinda Dunne.

Well, this is a massive occasion.

I've never done anything as big as this before. I'm really excited about it.

I'm going to try my best, and it doesn't matter if I win or not,

I just feel quite privileged being here.

Flautist Luke O'Toole, who's 18 and comes from Ormskirk

in Lancashire.

I've known about this competition ever since I was a little kid,

and I've always thought, "I'd love to be part of that one day."

When I found out I'd got through to the category final,

I just couldn't believe it.

And the fact that I could get into the semi is just

an amazing feeling, so I'm really going to go for it.

And 18-year-old Charlotte Cox from Guildford

on the bassoon.

I think it's quite a lot of preparation,

especially preparing yourself mentally just to be able to

get on stage in front of all the cameras.

You don't get many opportunities to play a 20-minute-long recital on bassoon.

It's a big achievement, getting to this stage,

and I think I'm just happy for being here.

So, here they are, our five woodwind finalists.

For me, what's really exciting about this woodwind final

is not only the contrasting instruments, but the wide range of

repertoire we're going to hear, from early music - we've even got

a harpsichord on stage - right the way to the present day.

There's a lot to look forward to and a lot for the judges to consider.

Let's find out what they're looking for.

The judges are:

Internationally renowned clarinettist Emma Johnson,

winner of the BBC Young Musician title in 1984.

I'm looking for something over and above technicality.

You can play as technically brilliantly as you like,

but it doesn't necessarily mean that people want to listen to you.

Another Young Musician finalist,

now one of Britain's leading flautists, Juliette Bausor.

The programme choices are very important in the competition.

You would like to hear them showing all of the different styles

that they can play.

And our general adjudicator,

conductor and founder of Sinfonia Cymru, Gareth Jones.

What's really very, very important is to show their understanding

of music of different styles and periods.

You have to have a real conviction in the programme that you've

put forward, and a belief in it.

What I'm hoping is there's going to be one person who stands out,

that ability to keep you listening.

All five, very different instruments it's going to be great

to hear all of them play tonight.

So, that's who our woodwind finalists here at the

Royal Welsh College of College of Music and Drama in Cardiff

will have to impress.

Emma and Juliette have both been on the Young Musician stage

themselves, so will know exactly what it feels like to face a jury,

a task that now falls to our first competitor.

At 15, Charlotte Barbour-Condini is our youngest of tonight's woodwind finalists.

She's already waiting backstage, ready to get us under way.

Charlotte's the only woodwind finalist not studying full-time

at a specialist music school.

But she's been playing the recorder since the age of six.

When I tell people that I play the recorder, they're usually like,

"That's not a proper instrument," because quite a lot of people

have played it in their primary school and it's viewed as

an instrument that's a stepping stone to playing other instruments in future.

Like most children at primary school, Charlotte started with

group recorder lessons, but she enjoyed it so much she moved on

to individual lessons.

When I first met her she... I mean, she stood out immediately.

She has a very sort of raw talent.

It's such an individual breath of fresh air, the way she plays.

I think it's great.

But the recorder's not Charlotte's only instrument -

she's a bit of a musical all-rounder.

She's also Grade 8 on both the piano and the violin,

and has a collection of competition trophies at home

to show for her hard work.

I still don't know whether I'm going to be a pianist, recorder player

or violinist, or whether I'm going to be a mixture of the three.

I'd really like to just keep all three for as long as possible,

but there does have to come a time when I do focus and decide

which one is my first instrument, because I still don't know.

Every time that she's concentrating on her instrument,

people always ask, "What is your favourite?"

And it's like, "Whichever one I'm playing", which is just perfect.

So, OK, I'm left and right, OK?

Generally, I think I concentrate on the instrument that I've got

a performance coming up in later,

but it's kind of sometimes a bit chaotic

when I'm performing in all three around the same time.

Charlotte has a busy week with school,

piano and violin lessons and hours of practice.

And there's no let-up at the weekend either.

She runs with her local athletics club and packs in even more music

at the Junior Royal Academy.

She takes part in orchestra, music theory

and recorder ensemble, and in the build-up to the woodwind final,

works on competition pieces with teacher Barbara Law.

When I started with Barbara,

she introduced me to a lot of more modern stuff,

as well as very early stuff, which is nice,

because I've got a wider range and repertoire.

I think repertoire is everything at this stage,

because there isn't the breadth of repertoire.

We're missing the whole sort of classical, romantic music

that the other instruments have got to draw upon,

so we've really got to make what we do choose

as interesting and as varied as possible,

and so, if that means going right back to mediaeval

and going right up until the present day,

then that's the way to go, I think.

I'm working on going further

with what you can do with the pieces,

especially with the Trotto, because it's such an early piece,

you would have added a lot of your own ornamentation.

Things like, when you got this, we've got that...

SHE PLAYS A SHORT PHRASE, TWICE

..You could do lots of flourishing, filling in of notes, there.

She's really encouraging me to always go further with that

and not be afraid to try things out.

Yeah.

She's really enthusiastic about the recorder, which is really good

because it gives me confidence.

Because it is so underrated, I want to fly the flag, as it were,

and show people that it is actually a proper instrument.

You know, for people that do take it seriously,

playing in schools,

that have got classmates that play other instruments

who say, "Well, it's not really a proper instrument, is it?"

This will be an opportunity for them to say, "Well, actually, it is."

Well, it's 12 years since a recorder player last reached

this stage of BBC Young Musician.

Doing her bit to champion the recorder

here's Charlotte Barbour-Condini, accompanied by Hristo Dushev.

"I'm starting my programme with Trotto

Which is a mediaeval dance.

It would have originally been played by a travelling band,

so Hristo and I have tried

to recreate that atmosphere with percussion.

APPLAUSE

How refreshing to see a recorder player in this category,

especially one as elegant and as mesmerising as Charlotte.

I'm so intrigued by the sound she's making. It's so expressive.

She is incredibly composed

and seems to really be enjoying herself out there.

APPLAUSE

Following two pieces of early music,

Charlotte played two pieces by contemporary composers,

including her finale music by German recorder virtuoso Hans-Martin Linde.

'Music for a Bird is one of the more experimental pieces I've played.

'It's trying to bring out bird song and it uses a lot of techniques that

'you wouldn't usually use, such as singing down the recorder.'

At first I was a bit self-conscious,

but...it's quite fun after you get over that self consciousness.

APPLAUSE

Well, Charlotte's certainly getting the evening off to a great start,

but what will the judges make of her performance?

She drew us straightaway into this ethereal world in the Trotto

at the very beginning and she never lost that really,

this sense of control.

-Charlotte, how did it feel out there?

-Yeah, it felt very good.

It's exciting, definitely.

We were with her from the first note to the last note. It was just magic.

-Any moments you particularly enjoyed?

-Er...I liked all of it.

So Charlotte sets a high standard for this woodwind final.

Waiting backstage, our next competitor

clarinettist Jordan Black.

Jordan Black is from Swindon in Wiltshire,

but this is a long way from where he spent his childhood.

I grew up in East Africa, in Kenya.

I moved there when I was about two and we stayed there for ten years.

Jordan started playing the clarinet at school in Nairobi,

when he was seven, but at the time had a different career in mind.

I wanted to be a Masai when I was younger and I always wanted a spear,

but I wasn't allowed one because it was just too dangerous,

so I kind of gave up that ambition to be a Masai.

Thankfully he stuck with the clarinet.

It was when Jordan started going to a school in Nairobi

that his music teacher picked up on his musical ability.

Jordan had the chance to show how much he's progressed

on a recent family holiday.

I went back to Kenya a few months ago.

I went back and played at my old school

in one of these big, Friday afternoon assemblies.

Some of the teachers are still at that old school,

like the director of music who first introduced me to the clarinet.

It was quite strange sitting back in the audience,

but instead of having an eight-year-old perform,

seeing him has an 18-year-old.

Jordan is now in his first year at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

The underlying atmosphere is that it's hard work working

and you're all there to become the best musician you possibly can.

There are plenty of musical opportunities available at the Academy

and in the build up to the category final, Jordan has the chance to work

on one of his competition pieces in a master class

with Robert Plane, one of the country's leading clarinettists.

Nothing can really compare to experience

and these gems of wisdom that, you know, people who are actually working

in the profession can offer you.

The air is travelling at an extraordinary velocity here.

Gra's a really dazzling virtuoso piece, but it's a real challenge

and learning it is like putting together a puzzle.

You get all the pieces perfectly formed

and then you structure them together again.

I think it's got huge potential as a competition piece.

It's really given me some ammunition to get

to the next stage in the piece,

so I think I'm going to really work on those things.

I thought it was very, very helpful.

Like all the competitors, Jordan is stacking up the practice hours

and taking any opportunity to rehearse with his accompanist

Daniel King Smith.

It's really, really nice to have someone accompanying me

who's been performing with me for quite a few years.

He's seen me play well and play not so well.

He knows, kind of, my weaknesses when I get nervous.

I can't really explain how important the role is of the accompanist.

It's chamber music at the end of the day, when you have two people

on the stage and that communication between those two is so important.

The piece becomes the piece of music that the composer intended

when you put the piano with it. It becomes a piece of music then.

APPLAUSE

So, here is Jordan Black with his accompanist, Daniel King Smith.

Tonight, I'm going to be starting with

the first movement of the Brahms F Minor Sonata,

the first of two sonatas he wrote for the clarinet,

and it's a very passionate piece,

very expressive in areas, especially at the end.

It's almost quite reflective.

APPLAUSE

Jordan, moving on from Brahms now with a piece

by leading American composer, Elliot Carter.

It's called Gra, which literally translates to Game, in Polish.

The important thing in this piece is to really get that sense of the game.

There are different characters.

There's a sort of expressive character.

Then there's a spikey, more rhythmic character.

I think the really important thing in this piece

is to get the contrast between those two characters.

APPLAUSE

I think Jordan is a fantastic clarinettist.

He's incredibly animated. To some, that might look like an affectation,

but I think, with him, it's really that he's been moved by the music.

I think he's got incredibly impressive dynamic range,

technically very, very assured,

but also very musical, very lyrical, very exquisite,

and we really saw the contrast between the Brahms

and the Elliot Carter, all the things he's capable of.

The final piece I'm going to play is The Carnival Of Venice,

arranged by Giampieri.

It's a set of variations on this really quite famous theme.

You know, there have been lots of different arrangements

for different instruments, but it's very playful,

it's fun to play, and it's quite rapid in places, it really moves.

APPLAUSE

All in all, I think that was an absolutely terrific performance.

I REALLY enjoyed his playing. Hugely technically accomplished.

I think he's coming off stage right now.

What I really did like about him was his forte playing.

The sound was really well rounded and very beautiful.

And breathe... Oh, my goodness!

That was absolutely sensational. How does it feel?

Oh, thank you. Oh, it was so exciting.

Pretty speechless at the moment, actually. We just had so much fun.

Jordan, a very fine clarinet player, and what fast finger work!

I mean, I would love to know what he has for breakfast,

because that was phenomenal!

So, we've heard from two of our Woodwind Finalists.

Still to come: Flautist, Luke O'Toole,

bassoonist, Charlotte Cox,

and up next, the 17-year-old saxophonist, Lucinda Dunne.

Lucinda is the first of two woodwind finalists

studying full-time at Chetham's School of Music.

Her instrument of choice - the saxophone.

The sax is just, it's a cool instrument, isn't it?

It can cover a lot of genres of music, like pop, jazz and classical.

And I think that's what I really like about it.

Some people don't really think of it as a classical instrument, but it is.

It is in orchestral pieces,

and there's a lot of concertos written for it.

And it is a classical instrument.

Lucinda has been playing the Saxophone for less than 4 years,

having started out on the piano then picking up the clarinet.

I think piano is a great grounding

when you come on to learning solo instruments.

You've got such a broad understanding

of how instruments are arranged, and so on.

She took to the other instruments like a duck to water,

because it's like one note at a time compared to on the piano,

there's a lot more going on.

It was suggested to us, actually through the piano teacher originally,

that she might have a try of going to Chetham's School in Manchester.

Since starting at Chetham's,

Lucinda has been able to satisfy her eclectic musical taste.

As I'm like a classical player mainly, I particularly enjoy playing in the big band,

because that's the main sort of jazz that I'm doing at the moment.

It's such a good sound, and it's really exciting

playing in a group where everyone else enjoys playing the jazz so much.

Yeah, music is really important to me now,

because that's what I'm planning on doing in the future now,

and I can't really imagine myself doing anything else.

Like, without it, I just don't know what I'd do.

So, Lucinda's dedicated to a career in music,

but given the sax's versatility,

will she pick classical music, pop, of even jazz?

As I'm going to music college next year,

I think I'll discover more what sort of music I'm going to get into.

I would like to play in pit orchestras, and musical theatre,

and I think that would be something that I'd really enjoy doing.

But for now thoughts of the future must wait,

Lucinda has her BBC Young Musician performance to prepare for,

with teacher, Andrew Wilson.

I've never played in a place as big as the hall in Cardiff.

So, in the lesson today, Andy was explaining to me

how you have to project so much more,

and play so much bigger than you expect,

because it's not going to carry as far

if you play the same as you do in your practice room.

OK, so now bring the volume down, but keep it vibrant like that.

She has this wonderful way of playing and making you listen.

And I always think it's a really good storyteller.

It's not just the story, it's the way it's told,

and it's the tone of the voice, as well.

She really has quite an easy job in convincing people

to really listen to her playing.

I'm excited about playing in Cardiff.

And, of course, I'm a little bit nervous about it as well,

but it's going to be good for me, to play in somewhere that big,

if that's what I'm planning on doing when I'm older.

APPLAUSE

So, hoping to fill the hall with the sound of the saxophone,

here's 17-year-old Lucinda Dunne,

starting with a piece by Paule Maurice.

Le Tableaux de Provence was written by a female French composer

when she was on holiday in Provence.

And each of the movements represent a different activity,

or thing, that they saw when they were on holiday there.

There are a few technical challenges, like fast runs, and scalic passages,

and, like, getting the atmosphere right for each movement,

but I really enjoy playing all the movements together.

It's a really good piece.

Lucinda Dunne playing the 1st Movement of Paule Maurice's Tableaux De Provence.

She also played two other movements from the piece including this, the 4th.

After that a musical journey through Provence,

Lucinda wrapped up her performance with a piece

by Spanish saxophonist and composer Pedro Iturralde.

The Pequena Czarda is a Spanish piece,

but "czardas" is a Hungarian dance

and this is the composer's take on this czardas.

It's quite a showy-offy piece compared to the other one.

It's got quite a lot of decorative bits

and it goes between major and minor

and there's slow passages and lots of quick passages as well.

APPLAUSE

Well, a couple of little slips at the end there

but still a lovely performance.

Very shy in person, Lucinda, but not at all on the stage.

Very technically accomplished, she seemed to really enjoy herself

and I think that people will be blown away

by what the classical saxophone is capable of.

I was a bit worried when I saw Lucinda's programme...

..because, you know, it's a French piece and a Spanish piece,

so all very Hispanic, but, actually,

'she...she totally convinced me.'

All done!

I particularly enjoyed the slow movement of the Maurice.

Um...I thought she played some beautiful colours.

-How are you feeling?

-Oh, I'm exhausted!

Oh, that was really good. I really enjoyed that.

Next, Lucinda's schoolmate from Chetham's, Luke O'Toole.

18-year-old flautist Luke has always wanted to be a professional musician.

He started playing when he was eight years old

and has been working towards his goal ever since.

I started at Chetham's when I was 13,

and, before that, I was at quite an academic school,

so I didn't have much time to practise

and so I thought Chetham's would just be a great place

where I could just do music all the time with different musicians

who are all like-minded.

It definitely spurs me on when there's so many great players at this school.

It really encourages you to practise hard

and really become the best you can be,

cos there's a lot of competition.

Luke is taught by the Halle Orchestra's principal flautist, Katherine Baker.

When I first met Luke, possibly you'd think he was quite a shy boy,

quiet, um...but as soon as he starts playing,

it was clear to me that he had the most phenomenal technique.

I it find hard, still now, not to laugh in the lessons

when he's zooming around the instrument.

I think when I started playing the flute,

I realised that I wanted to be a musician

and so really I was determined right from the beginning.

They used to give the kids a book to fill in with practice times.

Of course, most kids didn't fill anything in.

He used to go through book after book.

They must have thought we were making it up,

-but he used to practise of his own accord, um, day after day.

-Mmm.

Without pushing him and that - he did that himself, you know.

Outside of school, Luke plays alongside the finest young musicians in the country

in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain

where he's the Principal Flute.

It's just such an incredible experience,

working with amazing musicians,

for example, Natalie Clein on cello,

um...and really it's just an incredible experience

to play with people who are really determined

to get it to the highest standard possible.

Seeing that Natalie Clein's just done so amazingly well

from winning BBC Young Musician,

it just shows really what's out there and what opportunities

you can take if you really work hard

and try and achieve to get them.

So he's sort of gone back...

Luke lives at school during the week but at weekends

goes home to spend time with his family near Orsmkirk in Lancashire,

but flute practice is never far from his thoughts.

Sometimes I do go to the pool club in the local town

with my brother, Rob,

and we play a bit of pool or snooker there just to chill out, really.

But I do practise quite a lot at weekends,

but I feel more relaxed cos I'm at home

and so, in a way, I can get a lot more done.

For the category final, I've really had to up my game

and I've really started practising a lot more

and I think just sort of making myself really disciplined each day

and making sure that I get the practice done.

I'm a bit nervous,

but I'm generally just excited

and looking forward to giving my best, really.

And Luke going on...

Well, it's time to see if all that practice has paid off -

here's Luke O'Toole.

APPLAUSE

My first piece is the 1st Movement of Burton's Sonatina for Flute and Piano.

It's a really fun piece and I think it's a great opening piece.

It's not too technical,

it's mainly just trying to bring the melody across

which is the hardest thing.

APPLAUSE

Luke O'Toole's clearly a terrific flautist.

I cannot believe how strong this category is.

Every time you think, "Wow!" someone else comes along

and really blows your mind.

Next, Luke takes us back to the Baroque era

with a beautiful Bach sonata.

APPLAUSE

Luke O'Toole playing the 3rd Movement of Bach's Sonata in E Minor.

My final piece is Taffanel's Fantaisie Sur Le 'Freischutz'.

It's really just basically a big, grand virtuoso piece.

There's lots of lovely melodies as well as virtuosic passages,

so it's really fun to play.

APPLAUSE

Well, what an absolutely dazzling way to end a programme.

We saw a flautist win this category two years ago.

I wonder if we're about to see it happen all over again. It's very close to call.

This has been one of the strongest category finals I remember,

but certainly Luke O'Toole a fantastic addition to it.

I love the way he looks out at the audience.

It really engages everybody while he's playing,

even when playing millions of notes a second,

so very impressive player.

I just can't believe it's over really,

just preparing so much and now it's just gone over in a flash.

I thought it was a fantastic programme

and he played it with great panache and control,

fantastic finger dexterity there,

very fluid across the entire instrument.

It was just amazing. It was a great experience. I'll never forget it.

Well, this is such a strong category

and Luke is going to be a tough act to follow.

Time now for our final competitor - bassoonist Charlotte Cox.

18-year-old Charlotte grew up in Guildford in Surrey -

the eldest of four musical siblings.

Everyone's all very musical - my brother who plays violin,

my sister's at Guildhall doing oboe and plays the piano,

and then my younger sister is doing Royal Ballet.

She also plays the violin as well.

Like lots of woodwind players, Charlotte started out on the recorder

but she struggled to find the right environment to develop as a musician.

When I was about 13, um, and I'd already been to two secondary schools in Guildford,

which were, um, not really my type - I didn't really fit in with any of the cliques.

She'd struggled in local schools

because being a musician was different

and being different, as a young teenager, wasn't good.

No-one really took my music seriously

and obviously playing recorder is...

It's not really one of the cool things to do.

This a child who stood up at school and played a descant recorder

with all her peers there

because she felt so passionately about it.

Charlotte auditioned for the Purcell School of Music,

a move that would change her life.

At Purcell, it's like...

There's like no cliques, like, everyone fits in -

probably the weirder you are, the cooler you are, really.

I just became who I am now,

like, my character and personality.

I was able to flourish and really be what I wanted to be, I think.

Charlotte is now a first-year student at the Royal College of Music in London.

The Royal College Of Music just seemed like the perfect transition from Purcell.

It's a really lovely atmosphere, really good woodwind department.

Obviously, I was drawn there because of Julie, um...

who I really wanted to learn with.

Julie Price is herself a previous woodwind finalist

in BBC Young Musician,

her experience proving invaluable

in helping Charlotte prepare for the competition.

With Charlotte, what we need to do is work on the expressive side

of the playing, because that's what she's more afraid to do.

We work a lot about breathing

because I think if you get the breathing right,

then your sound is going to be good

and if you feel you're making a good sound,

then you can find the extremes of the emotional spectrum

I think that she particularly needs to do.

-Stop. Release the tension here.

-Yeah.

The repertoire for bassoon is very limited,

so it's even more important to pick

the best programme you can get out of the repertoire you've got,

showing something unique about your personality and about the instrument.

Julie's much more focused on sound quality and musicality

and not so much on the fast technical stuff.

I quite like the fast pieces!

I think they're quite fun.

I think you have to be quite arrogant on stage.

You have to have quite a lot of confidence

to be able to sacrifice all your feelings

in front of everyone in the audience.

It's quite nerve-racking,

but I suppose, when you get on stage and you're playing,

it kind of all goes away.

Charlotte. And Charlotte going on.

APPLAUSE

Well, hoping to keep the nerves at bay in order to impress the judges, here's Charlotte.

Her programme takes us on a musical journey

with pieces by Polish, German, French and Russian composers, but she begins in Italy.

'I'm starting with a Marcello sonata which is actually for the cello,'

which is seriously demanding cos obviously it's for cello,

so there's no spaces to breathe or anything,

but it's a nice piece.

APPLAUSE

Next, we head to Poland.

I'm doing a piece by Tansman, Tansman's Sonatine.

I'm just doing the 1st Movement of that,

which is one of my all-time favourite pieces for bassoon.

It's very exciting and energetic and very enjoyable to play, I think.

APPLAUSE

The 1st Movement of Sonatine by the Polish composer Alexandre Tansman.

Next, from Charlotte's diverse repertoire,

the music of a German composer, Carl Maria von Weber.

That's Charlotte playing the 2nd Movement of Weber's Concerto in F Major,

she also played French composer Marcel Bitsch's Concertino

and ended her 20-minute recital

with a bit of a popular classic from Russia.

My last piece is Flight Of The Bumblebee by Rimsky-Korsakov,

which I thought is quite a nice end to a programme

and it shows my character, I think.

It's very full-on and quite technically challenging,

but hopefully I'll pull it off.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Well, the audience obviously enjoyed Charlotte's performance

but what did the judges make of it?

It's a bold thing to do, to choose lots of very different short pieces.

For me, there were many discoveries there.

A sound like velvet and cocoa.

I mean, it's just such a beautiful beautifully rich sound.

How are you feeling? It was such a fantastic performance.

Er, really happy with it.

Um, I got through it!

She took on a lot of styles and was very accomplished indeed.

Well, there you have it -

five really impressive woodwind performances

but only one is going through to the semifinal.

I think it's going to be a tough one to call,

but, luckily, I don't have to make the decision. It's over to the jury.

Making that tough decision

are internationally-renowned clarinettist...

I think that was some final tonight, I have to say,

and great to have, firstly, five different instruments represented

and some instruments that you wouldn't normally expect to see.

It started off with Charlotte. I was really impressed

that she'd managed to find such a diverse programme for an instrument

-that is not exactly blessed in repertoire terms.

-No.

-We were really in medieval times, weren't we?

-Absolutely.

She drew us all in. It was very ethereal, her sound.

She captivated the audience straightaway. She never lost that.

Then we had Jordan Black.

I think, again, a very, very good programme,

a very well-balanced programme.

Started off with the Brahms,

maybe the Apassionata,

that's part of the direction at the beginning of the movement,

I don't know, wasn't quite there maybe.

-But what fast playing!

-Amazing!

-Oh, gosh, the Carnival of Venice

was some feat, I must say. It was terrific.

Lucida Dunne, saxophone.

Again, an instrument that one doesn't expect to see

at this stage and difficult, really,

in terms of where she can draw her repertoire from

to give a lot of variety, you know, did very, very well.

-I think...

-Yes.

-There was some beautiful playing in there.

She made some gorgeous, warm, richer, louder...

Yes, I loved the really passionate playing

at the top of her range - it really was exciting

to be in the hall with that going on, wasn't it?

And then we had the flautist Luke O'Toole.

Wonderful control. Again, lovely, lovely long phrases

and great simplicity in the Bach, which I really wanted.

He's got such maturity and poise in his playing already.

So much potential there.

I think occasionally that he could have used...

-varied the vibrato and tonal colours a little bit more perhaps.

-Yeah.

And Charlotte Cox, bassoonist.

Charlotte gave us, I think, what, some programme!

-That was... Talk about cramming...

-Yeah.

-..so many styles and, er...

It was a really big, big programme.

-It seemed as though it was HER voice, didn't it?

-Yeah, very much so.

And this wonderful rich sound.

I think we have a difficult decision to make.

So the jury now have to pick a winner.

For the parents, though, they're all winners already.

Absolutely amazing. I cried.

She did herself proud, I think.

-She gave it everything and we were very proud of her.

-Yeah.

Fantastic.

Listening to my daughter, first of all, was very nerve-racking.

In fact, I don't think I heard most of it, I was shaking so much!

It was great to see Jordan on form and we just loved...

We just felt really proud of him tonight, so we're thrilled for him.

But who are the audience's favourites.

-Bassoonist.

-I think the flautist.

-The flautist, yes.

-Definitely.

Being a flautist, I thought the flautist was fantastic,

but also the young girl who played recorder was pretty fantastic,

I thought, as well.

I actually can't pick a winner.

It was brilliant, really good standard.

Got five very anxious young people waiting backstage.

Of course, only one of them is going through to the BBC Young Musician semifinal,

and to tell us who that is, here's jury member and former Young Musician Emma Johnson.

Well, this has been an incredible evening.

I can't remember a final when I've heard such variety and such wonderful music-making.

We have one musician who we thought stood out.

The winner of the BBC Young Musician 2012

woodwind category final is...

Charlotte Barbour-Condini.

RAPTUROUS APPLAUSE

And what an amazing reaction in the hall.

History being made - the first time a recorder has ever won

the woodwind category of BBC Young Musician.

It was a tough decision.

The standard was incredibly high.

Recorder players of the world rejoice!

What a wonderful thing. Congratulations. How does it feel?

Er, I'm very shocked, yeah.

I'm very happy.

She has such poise, such presence, and captivated us from the very first note.

She kind of teases your ear with the way she plays phrases

and you wonder what she's going to do next,

as though she's telling you a story and that's quite a rare gift.

The judges said that you really stood out. How does that feel?

Er... Er...I don't know.

Um...surprising.

Well, we'll let you go and embrace your family

-and celebrate this amazing moment. Congratulations.

-Thank you.

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

Well done, sweetheart. Congratulations.

You deserve it, you deserve it, you deserve it. Well done.

What an emotional night.

Huge congratulations to Charlotte

who we'll be hearing from a week tomorrow,

when coverage of BBC Young Musician 2012 switches to BBC2 for the semifinal.

In the meantime, you can join me here again on BBC4 next Friday

when the last of our precious semifinal spots

will be taken by one of five talented young percussionists.

Here's a little look at the treats we've got in store.

Playing that first note is always the hardest moment.

I can't wait to show what I can do.

I'm feeling excited about it now.

Just to win it would be amazing.

Go and have a laugh, enjoy it and I think that's what I'm going to do.

I absolutely loved it, complete control, very impressive.

Really lively - very, very energetic performance.

A touch of class, no doubt about it.

Quite spectacular, just something else.

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