Seventeen-year-old pianist Rachel Cheung Wai-ching has won a major international contest after becoming its youngest finalist this year.
She took fifth prize in the 16th Leeds International Piano Competition on Saturday night, the best by someone from Hong Kong at the event. The year-two piano Academy for Performing Arts student performed Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No 2 in the final round of the contest in Leeds, northern England, where six finalists competed.
Russian Sofya Gulyak, 29, won the competition. Second, third and fourth prizes respectively went to Ukrainian Alexej Gorlatch, 21, Italian Alessandro Taverna, 25, and Frenchman David Kadouch, 23. Kong Jaining, 23, from the mainland, came sixth. Rachel received GBP6,550 (HK$84,600), and some highly prestigious engagements, an academy spokeswoman said.
The young pianist said she had not expected to win anything and was just trying to enjoy the music. She thanked her teacher, Professor Eleanor Wong Yee-lun, the academy's senior lecturer (keyboards) and artist-in-residence.
Professor Gabriel Kwok Ka-tak, the academy's head of keyboards, said: 'We are extremely happy and proud of Rachel's achievement in this important competition. She is a most talented and very hard-working student, and always plays with sincerity and musicality.'
Rachel was a student at Maryknoll Convent School and joined the academy when she was 15. She won second prize at the Alessandro Casagrande International Piano Competition in Italy last year and first prize at the Gina Bachauer International Junior Piano Competition in the United States in 2004.
