Eric Lu Eric Lu

Eric Lu (born December 15, 1997) is a Chinese-American classical pianist. At 20 years old, he won the First Prize and Gold Medal at the Leeds International Piano Competition in 2018. Lu also was a prizewinner at the 17th International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, Poland in 2015 when he was 17 years old.

Biography

Eric Lu was born in Massachusetts to immigrant parents from Kaohsiung and Shanghai. He grew up in Bedford, Massachusetts, and started piano studies at the age of six with Dorothy Shi (杨镜钏), near Boston, Massachusetts. Later on, he enrolled at the New England Conservatory Preparatory School, where he studied piano with Alexander Korsantia and A. Ramon Rivera. In 2013, he was admitted into the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he currently studies with Jonathan Biss and Robert McDonald. He is also a pupil of the pianist Dang Thai Son.

In 2018, at age 20, Lu won the First Prize and Gold Medal at the Leeds International Piano Competition. He played Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 4 in the finals with the Hallé Orchestra conducted by Edward Gardner. After winning, he was immediately signed by Askonas Holt and Warner Classics. His first concert after winning Leeds was a debut with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko. Subsequent notable debuts have included recitals at Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris, Saint Petersburg Philharmonia, and Shanghai Grand Theatre. His UK recital debut in Bristol was praised by The Guardian: 'Lu seems already to possess something of the magic touch of early Leeds laureates Murray Perahia and Radu Lupu'. In June 2019, Lu replaced Martha Argerich in a concert with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. Lu made his debut at the 2019 BBC Proms at London's Royal Albert Hall with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and Yu Long.

In October 2015, he participated in the XVII International Chopin Piano Competition, winning the 4th prize at the age of 17, becoming one of the youngest laureates in the history of the competition. He joins the likes of pianists such as Krystian Zimerman, Daniil Trifonov, and Yundi Li, who also won prizes in this competition while still in their teens. Earlier in 2014, he won 1st Prizes at the Moscow International Fryderyk Chopin Competition for Young Pianists, and the US National Chopin Competition in Miami (2015). Shortly afterwards, he performed at the 70th International Chopin Festival in Duszniki, Poland. He went on a tour of Japan and Korea with the Warsaw Philharmonic along with the other prizewinners of the Chopin Competition in January 2016. In 2017, he won the International German Piano Award in Frankfurt.

Awards

• 2010 - XII Ettlingen International Competition for Young Pianists(Germany) - 1st Prize
• 2013 - III Minnesota International e-Piano Junior Competition - 1st Prize, and Schubert Prize
• 2014 - IX Moscow International Fryderyk Chopin Competition for Young Pianists - 1st Prize
• 2015 - IX US National Chopin Competition - 1st Prize, and prize for best performance of a Concerto
• 2015 - XVII International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, Poland - 4th Prize
• 2017 - VII International German Piano Award, Frankfurt, Germany - 1st Prize and FAZ-Audience-Award
• 2018 - Leeds International Piano Competition - 1st Prize, Terence Judd–Hallé Orchestra Prize