Maria (Maj) Lind, née Kopjeff (1876–1942) was a philanthropist, who studied piano in

Kuopio Kuopio ( , ) is a city in Finland and the regional capital of North Savo. It is located in the Finnish Lakeland. The population of Kuopio is approximately , while the Kuopio sub-region, sub-region has a population of approximately . It is the mos ...

and

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

. She married a Helsinki businessman, Arvid Lind, and inherited a considerable fortune when he died. She left a bequest "for the development of pianists" to the

Sibelius Academy The Sibelius Academy (, ) is part of the University of the Arts Helsinki and a university-level music school which operates in Helsinki and Kuopio, Finland. It also has an adult education centre in Järvenpää and a training centre in Seinäjoki ...

. This money was used to fund the International Maj Lind Piano Competition, which has been held since 1945 and was opened to international competitors in 2002.History of the International Maj Lind Piano Competition
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References

Finnish patrons of the arts Finnish pianists Finnish women pianists Finnish philanthropists Finnish women philanthropists 20th-century Finnish women musicians 19th-century Finnish women musicians 1876 births 1942 deaths {{Finland-bio-stub