NEC Prizewinners Chopin Competition

Three NEC-trained pianists have won the first, third and sixth prizes in the Ninth National Chopin Competition, held this past week in Miami, FL.  Eric Lu ’13 Prep, a 17-year old pianist from Bedford, MA, who studied with A. Ramon Rivera and Alexander Korsantia while a student in the NEC Preparatory School, won first prize. He received $75,000 in prize money, the prize for best concerto performance, a concert tour in the US and abroad (including a performance in Weill Concert Hall at Carnegie Hall in June), and automatic entry into the world’s premiere Chopin competition—the XVII Fryderyk Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw, Poland, October 3—23, 2015. 

Currently a student at the Curtis Institute, where he studies with Jonathan Biss and Robert McDonald, as well as a student of Chopin specialist Dang Thai Son, Lu has won numerous competitions including the 2014 Moscow Chopin International Competition.  In 2013, he triumphed at the Minnesota International e-Piano Junior Competition, receiving the first prize and the special Schubert Prize. In 2010, he won the top prize of the prestigious 12th Ettlingen International Piano Competition in Germany, where he was praised for a musical understanding far beyond his years. Other awards include first prize at the 2013 A. Ramon Rivera Piano Competition, the special prize chosen by the public at the 2011 Junior Academy Eppan in Italy, and second prize at the 2009-2010 Music Teachers National Association National Piano Competition.

Third Prize winner George Li ’13 Prep, who studies with Wha-Kyung Byun and Russell Sherman, completed his studies in the Preparatory School and went on to be admitted to the Harvard NEC A.B. M.M. joint degree program. He, too, has numerous competition prizes to his credit and has been a winner of the Young Concert Artists Auditions and the Gilmore Young Artist Award. He won $20,000 in prize money and the prize for best sonata performance.

Alexander Beyer ’17 AB Harvard ’18 M.M.NEC, like Li, a student of Wha-Kyung Byun and Russell Sherman and a participant in the Harvard/NEC joint degree program, won sixth prize and $4000. As a winner of the NEC Piano Honors Competition he made his Jordan Hall debut in 2014. He was a 2012 US Presidential Scholar in the Arts. 

Held at the Miami- Dade Auditorium, the national competition is presented by The Chopin Foundation of the United States. Twenty-four pianists between the ages of 17 and 29 participated. The panel of jurors included Agustin Anievas, Jury Chair, Sergei Babayan, Ian Hobson, Krzysztof Jablonski, Kevin Kenner, Dean Kramer, Jon Nakamatsu, Katarzyna Popowa-Zydron, and Margarita Shevchenko.

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