The International Queen Elisabeth Violin Competition winner has been announced as 26-year-old American violinist Stella Chen. She walks away with a cash prize and a number of international bookings.
Candidates performed a concerto of their choice along with Finnish composer Kimmo Hakola’s unpublished work, Fidl Op 99, accompanied by Belgian National Orchestra under Hugh Wolff. Chen is set to receive €25,000, a CD recording and a chance to perform on the ‘Huggins’ 1708 Stradivarius for four years, presented by Nippon Music Foundation.
Previously a pupil of Itzhak Perlman and Miriam Fried, Chen now studies at The Juilliard School with Li Lin and Catherine Cho. She has won prizes at Yehudi Menuhin Competition and Tibor Varga Competition and has also been awarded the Robert Levin Prize.
Second place along with €20,000 was awarded to 25-year-old Canadian Timothy Chooi, while third prize of €17,000 went to Stephen Kim, 23, from the US. Fourth, fifth and sixth places went to Shannon Lee, Júlia Pusker, and Cristina Goicea.
The remaining unranked finalists, Luke Hsu, Sylvia Huang, Seiji Okamoto, Eva Rabchevska, Ji Won Song and Yukiko Uni, each received €4,000 each. The Audience Prize, worth €2,500, went to Sylvia Huang who was the only Belgian violinist in the Brussels-based event.
Sitting on the 2019 violin jury were Pierre Amoyal, Martin Beaver, Corina Belcea, Patrice Fontanarosa, Pamela Frank, Lorenzo Gatto, Koichiro Harada, Yossif Ivanov, Dong-Suk Kang, Victor Kissine, Jaime Laredo, Shirly Laub, Mihaela Martin, Midori, Natalia Prischepenko, Vadim Repin and Arabella Steinbacher.