A solemn celebration of Chopin

Lu, Chen, and Wang – the prize-winners of this year’s International Chopin Competition in Warsaw – performed at the Berlin Philharmonie as part of the Meister-Klavierabend (Master Pianists’ Evenings) concert series.
This prestigious series brings to the Berlin Philharmonie some of the world’s most distinguished contemporary piano virtuosos: Bruce Liu, Khatia Buniatishvili, Ivo Pogorelich, Jan Lisiecki, and Roman Borisov.
The cycle was inaugurated with a special performance by the laureates of the 2025 International Chopin Competition, appearing directly after the Warsaw finals.

The first and only joint concert by the top three pianists in the 19th Warsaw Chopin Competition took place on Wednesday in Berlin’s so-called ‘small’ Philharmonie. With its 1,136 seats, the hall can sometimes feel too large for chamber music. Yet, focused on a single Steinway, its resonance becomes simply perfect; one can, as the saying goes, ‘hear a pin drop’.

Twenty-six-year-old Zitong Wang, from China, a winner of the bronze medal, takes a while to settle. She scurries through the Mazurka in G major; the final note breaks off too soon. The second Mazurka from Op. 50, in A flat major, still sounds restrained – every nuance of rubato meticulously calculated, unlike her freer performance in the third round of the competition. Wang finds herself, and Chopin’s lyricism, in the third piece, the C sharp minor Mazurka. And finally, in the Scherzo in B minor, Op. 20, she is completely in her element – a virtuoso graced by the gods.

From a purely pianistic point of view, all three young competitors are compelling born winners, flawless and faultless. The same holds for Kevin Chen, the second prize laureate. At twenty, he was one of the youngest participants, hailing from Canada. Chen displays an astonishing artistic maturity, wondrously documented dazzlingly in his transparent interpretation of the Twelve Etudes, Op. 10. Piece by piece, a unique panorama of musical discourse unfolds. Unheard colours emerge, unleashed depth, the finest singing tone. The audience is enraptured and demands encores. But not yet – those are reserved for the first prize winner: Eric Lu.

He appears only after the intermission. Trained in the United States, Lu, at 28, was among the oldest contestants in this year’s competition. His reputation precedes him: an intellectual at the keyboard. He already holds a recording contract with Warner (Mozart, Schubert, Brahms). He celebrates Chopin as if in a sacred ritual; every phrase of the Nocturne in C sharp minor from Op. 27 is charged with meaning. Exquisite sequences of tones intone slowly, in emphatically restrained tempi. The Funeral March from the Sonata in B flat minor, Op. 35 drifts into eternity. It anticipates his second encore: the Aria from Bach’s Goldberg Variations.

Which of the three will now blaze forth on a meteoric career, and who will endure in the long run – that remains to be seen. Yet this Berlin recital, of the highest standard, was completely sold out even before it was announced who would play. Many piano devotees from near and far came to experience live the adventure they had studiously followed online over the past weeks. Many were unable to secure ticket.

Eleonore Büning