Prague Spring International Piano Competition

The prize-giving ceremony takes place in the Brožík Room in the Old Town City Hall of Prague, with the mayor always traditionally attending.

Past piano laureates include Mindru Katz, Zdeněk Hnát, Pavel Štěpán, and Ivo Kahanek.

The Prague Spring Competition is now among the most widely recognized internationally, not only because it has discovered a respectable number of artists for the rest of the world (more past laureates include James Galway, Natalia Gutman, Natalia Shakhovskaya, Jan Panenka, Michel Becquet, Philippe Cuper, Dagmar Pecková, and Štefan Margita), but also because it was a founding member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions (WFIMC) in Geneva.

[citation needed] The idea of organizing an international music competition as part of the famous Prague Spring Festival came from Rafael Kubelík and members of the Czech Philharmonic in 1946.

Members of the jury in the piano competition have included: Raoul Koczalski, Rudolf Firkusny, Lazar Berman, Lev Oborin, Pál Kadosa, Ilona Štěpánová-Kurzová, Guido Agosti, Eugene List, Pavel Štěpán, Jerzy Zurawlew, Jan Ekier, Jacques Février, Vera Gornostayeva, Jacob Lateiner, Josef Palenicek, Fanny Waterman, and Barbara Hesse-Bukowska.