 Other winners include Russian pianists Elisabeth Leonskaja, in 1964, and Dmitri Alexeev, in 1970.The competition started in 1958, as part of the George Enescu Festival, and celebrated its first five editions (1958, 1961, 1964, 1967, and 1970) in what was then the Socialist Republic of Romania.It was considered, by the countries of the Eastern Bloc, one of the most prestigious music competitions.