Pianist Lim Yunchan on June 18 plays in the final round of the 16th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, Texas.

By Jung Joo-ri and Lee Jihae
Photos = Van Cliburn's official Facebook

Lim Yunchan is the youngest winner in the history of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition of the U.S.

Lim on June 18 posted the highest score among the six competitors in the final round to win at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, Texas.

He played in the final round Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor and Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, with the competition's jury president Marin Alsop as conductor.

At the competition's minimum age of 18, Lim was the youngest among the 30 participants and became the youngest winner in the 60-year history of the event.

He also won on the same day two other accolades: the Carla and Kelly Thompson Audience Award, which is based on the votes of 30,000 classic music fans worldwide, and Beverley Taylor Smith Award for Best Performance of a New Work, given for a modern piece.

Lim's gold medal at the Van Cliburn competition earned him a cash prize of USD 100,000 (around KRW 130 million) and the chance to record albums, receive world-class management and go on a global tour for three years.

Since its inception in 1962, the quadrennial event is named after American pianist Van Cliburn (1934-2013), who won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958 in Moscow. The Van Cliburn contest is one of the world's most prestigious for classical music along with the International Chopin Piano Competition (Poland), Queen Elisabeth Competition (Belgium) and International Tchaikovsky Competition (Russia).

Born in 2004 and with no experience studying abroad, Lim is a student at Korea National University of Arts in Seoul. At age 15 in 2019, he became the youngest winner of Korea's Isang Yun International Competition, and a year earlier, he won second prize at the Cleveland International Piano Competition for Young Artists and the Chopin Special Award. 

Lim Yunchan (center), winner of the 16th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition of the U.S., on June 18 poses for a commemorative photo with runners-up Anna Geniushene (left) from Russia, who won the silver, and Dmytro Choni from Ukraine, who won the bronze.