Anna Agafia Egholm (19) from Denmark is the youngest contestant in the second round. This time she had to play two set pieces: “Maze” composed by Jesper Koch for this competition, and then a Beethoven sonata; in addition, each contestant plays a piece of their own choosing, and Anna’s choice was Ravel’s Tzigane. We asked her what she thought of the second round.

- Playing the second round was very interesting and very tough. It’s a long programme this time, and the three pieces are very exacting.”

As well as the difficulties posed by the competition pieces, Anna Egholm faced another challenge on the third day of the competition.

- I’ve got a problem with my violin. It’s to do with the strings. I’ve tried cleaning them and it helped a bit compared to yesterday, but some of the notes are still disappearing.

Any violin novice might ask “Why don’t you just change them?”

Anna Egholm explains why this wouldn’t help:

- It takes at least two days for new strings to settle in well enough to play in a concert, and by then the competition will be over!.

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