Hello.

I'm Pia Toscano, coming to you from Nashville, Tennessee.

And this is Classicalia, a brand new PBS competition that's on the search for the greatest young classical musicians in the world.

We received entries from performers all over.

Now, the 12 performers who rose to the top will face off.

Who will win?

You'll have to watch to find out.

Nikka Gershman from Los Angeles, California, is about to show her mastery of the flute.

She's squaring off against saxophonist Gisella Dekort Mesalles from Terrassa, Spain.

First, let's go to Nikka, who's in Southern California right now.

Nikka, it's a pleasure to meet you, sweetheart.

It is an honor to be on this program.

Thank you so much for inviting me.

Of course.

Man, you are absolutely incredible!

I used to play the flute in junior high school, and I didn't sound anything like that.

I'm sure you were amazing.

No, no, not like you.

So you must have put in a lot of hard work.

Tell me what all the years of practice were like for you.

The flute actually came to me in a dream when I was six years old.

And so it's been eight years of hard work and dedication.

And the morning when I woke up from that dream, I went to my mom and I said, om, I want a flute.

And she wanted to make sure that it wasn't another whim.

So she brought me to the instrument store to try out all sorts of different types of instruments.

First, I tried a violin where I felt like my neck was totally cranking.

So then I went to the cello where the string almost broke, and the clarinet wasn't a much bigger success than that.

But then, the first time I put the flute to my lips, an effortlessly beautiful sound came out and everyone in the music store gasped.

And that's where my journey began.

Well, that's amazing.

And we are so grateful that you chose the flute as well.

Thank you.

We are so, so, so excited to see you perform.

Nikka, That was amazing.

Oh, my gosh.

Well, whether or not you win, I think you should be very proud of that performance.

Now I'm going to turn it over to Arabella Fenyves in Vienna.

Thank you so much, Pia.

I'm here in Vienna, Austria, with Gisela Dekort Mesalles.

Gisella,Welcome.

You've been studying at the Conservatory two years early, so you joined the conservatory two years earlier than usual.

You've already performed with big orchestras and you've won international competitions.

So what's important for you in music, then?

For me, the most important thing in music is to get to the public and to make the public feel emotions.

Tell me, what else do you like to do when you're not playing the sax?

Do you have any hobbies?

I like to do many things.

I like to do sports.

I like cooking a bit.

Not so much, but cooking.

Huh?

What do you like to cook?

I really like to cook desserts.

Desserts?

Okay.

The best part is when you eat them!

How do you like Vienna?

It's my favorite city.

I really excited to be here.

Oh, I'm so glad.

I'm excited to have you here.

And I'm excited to hear you play all the best.

All of our Classicalia contestants are so dedicated.

They've spent years practicing and perfecting their skills, but now it's time to see who will move on to the next round.

So it's time to say hello to our judges again.

We have Albert Frantz.

He's a Bösendorfer artist, a concert pianist and an educator.

And we have Gerald Grünbacher.

He's the founder and managing director of the Vienna Mozart Orchestra and a former clarinetist with the Vienna Philharmonic.

It's very hard to make a decision ... again.

And Gisela is on the stage.

She performed marvelous.

I think I know a little bit the difficulties of saxophone, and she knows everything much, much better than me.

And but of course, Nikka, she also plays very, very, very, very well.

Albert?

So that was a very heartfelt performance and it really struck me as as masterful.

I'm a pianist.

I'm not a wind player, but I read the score and I can imagine that's not it's not just technically difficult piece, but also emotionally difficult.

So congratulations.

And I've really enjoyed the flute performance by Nikka as well of a very famous famously sad piece.

And everything was beautifully expressed.

I did have a feeling that there's still there's more sadness to uncover.

And I wonder if that's a piece that you would want to play later in life.

But it sounds like that's one of the pieces that you'd always want to come back to, you know, that it will kind of grow with you as you grow as an artist.

And you know, there are many beautiful pieces like that in music.

Albert, Gerald, thanks so much for your feedback.

Well, now we can only send one of you on to round two.

So the winner is ... Gisela Dekort Mesalles.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

Gisela, how do you feel about going on to the next round?

I'm really excited.

Yeah.

How did you feel about what the judges had to say?

I liked it very much, the comments, because it was really good feedback and I really very happy.

Congratulations.