During the awards ceremony at the final concert on 12 June 2018, the seven-member international jury awarded the 1st prize worth CHF 30,000 to the American pianist Claire Huangci (born 1990 in New York), for her interpretation of Piano Concerto No. 4 in G major op. 58 by Ludwig van Beethoven, accompanied by the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich under the musical direction of jury president Christian Zacharias.
The pianist, who lives in Hanover, was also awarded the Mozart Prize sponsored by the Musikkollegium Winterthur.
Claire Huanci has already made major appearances in international concert halls, having studied at the Curtis Institute of Music, with Gary Graffman in Philadelphia, and with Arie Vardi at the Academy of Music, Drama & Media in Hanover.
Jong Hai Park (born 1986, Seoul) from South Korea was awarded the 2nd prize. His performance of Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor op. 15 by Johannes Brahms enabled the young pianist, who also studied under Vardi in Hanover, to claim the prize money of CHF 20,000.
Sergey Tanin, the 24-year-old Russian born in Nerjungri (Yakutia), was the youngest of the three winners, taking the 3rd prize (CHF 10,000), for his interpretation of Brahms D minor Piano Concerto No. 1 op. 15. After his studies at Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Conservatory with Irina Plotnikova, he attracted attention at the Bremen Piano Competition in 2016. With his poetic and intimate piano playing, he sparked great enthusiasm among the Zurich audience and subsequently received the “Audience Award” donated by IHAG Privatbank.
The Schumann Prize (CHF 5,000) for the best Schumann interpretation in the competition was donated by Artists Management Co. Ltd. and was awarded to Honggi Kim, a South Korean student studying in Frankfurt. The 20-year-old Italian Gloria Cianchetta received the Hortense Anda-Bührle Sponsorship Award (CHF 3,000) for her exceptional artistic achievement in the first two rounds of the competition.
The live recordings from the 2nd round of competition can currently be accessed via http://www.geza-anda.ch.
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