Kevin Chen performs Beethoven, Chopin, and Liszt

Canadian pianist Kevin Chen took first prize at the 2021 Franz Liszt Competition in Budapest, the 2022 Concours de Genève, and the 2023 Arthur Rubinstein Piano Master Competition in Tel Aviv—incredible accolades for any artist, but staggeringly impressive for one who was born in 2005! Now 18, this phenom of uncommon artistic maturity takes the stage of Paris's Fondation Louis Vuitton for a soulful and virtuosic Romantic program, featuring the first of Beethoven's complex late sonatas (Op. 101 in A), Chopin's dazzling Polonaise-Fantaisie and stormy Ballade No. 4 in F Minor, and a Franz Liszt lineup that would make a lesser pianist tremble, including two Hungarian-tinged Csárdás, the diabolical Erlkönig (transcribed from Schubert), and the passionate Réminiscences de Norma—an audacious and undeniable statement of arrival from a pianist you'll be seeing much more of in the coming years.

Photo © Fabrice Umiglia