Back

Celebration of Talent

Competitions

Fort Worth officially Transforms Into international ‘Pianotown’ for the 2025 Cliburn Competition

After two and a half weeks of thrilling performances at Van Cliburn Concert Hall at TCU and Bass Performance Hall, joined in the Final and Semifinal rounds by the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and conductors Marin Alsop and Carlos Miguel Prieto, the jury of the Seventeenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition announced its winners.

Aristo Sham took the top spot, becoming the first pianist from Hong Kong to win in the Cliburn´s history. Having studied economics at Harvard and music at Juilliard, Sham was a surprise choice to the press, but not to the Cliburn audience: he won the audience award by more than 9000 votes. Vitaly Starikov came in second, Evren Ozel was third among a long list of outstanding young pianists. Not an easy job for the jury, which had to to listen to 55 hours of music over the course of the competition, as the 28 invited pianists (out of 240 applications) became 12, then six.

It´s not so much about the financial rewards (the First Prize winner receives a cash award of USD 100.000) rather than the huge exposure, the great performing opportunities and the immense audio and video coverage. After the spectacular win of Yunchan Lim at the previous competition (His 2021 Cliburn performance of Rachmaninov’s third piano concerto is now the most-watched version of that concerto online, with more than 17m views) expectations were high: the 2025 competition broadcast received over 20 million views from a global audience in more than 145 countries. But all these numbers are not only reflecting a huge interest in the Cliburn from abroad: this year, the city of Fort Worth joined in the frenzy as well and Mayor Mattie Parker together with President and CEO Jacques Marquis officially declared the city “Pianotown”, marking its transformation into a global capital of piano during the competition.

Aristo Sham with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and Conductor Marin Alsop

Aristo Sham’s mother taught piano in their Hong Kong home, so he says: “I was enveloped in the environment of the piano even before I was born.” His parents recall his immense curiosity towards the instrument when he was a toddler and started him in lessons (with another teacher) when he was 3. At the age of 10, he began competing and concertizing. But he also went to regular schools, never making the conscious decision of focusing solely on the piano or his other studies; this made the dual degree program at Harvard and the New England Conservatory a perfect fit when he went to college. He finished his Bachelor of Arts at Harvard in 2019 and master’s at NEC under Victor Rosenbaum in 2020. He then went to the Ingesund School of Music in Sweden to study with Julia Mustonen-Dahlkvist before returning to the States to earn an artist diploma at The Juilliard School with Robert McDonald and Orli Shaham.  

“All art is essentially the chemical reaction between the stimuli of the world and the artist, and music is no exception. I try to take in everything that happens around me and seek out diverse and juxtaposing experiences; I believe this is an integral part of my artistic being, which is the source of my music-making and hopefully reflected in my playing.” 
Aristo Sham
 

Aristo was featured in the documentary The World’s Greatest Musical Prodigies on Channel 4 (UK) and has performed for royalty, including King Charles. He’s a laureate of international competitions, with first-prize wins at Ettlingen, Gina Bachauer, and Monte Carlo Music Masters, and is on the Young Concert Artists roster. He has concertized across Asia, Europe, and the United States, with major highlights including the London Symphony Orchestra under Sir Simon Rattle, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra under Edo de Waart, English Chamber Orchestra under the late Sir Raymond Leppard, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, and Minnesota Orchestra.  

His interests remain varied as he pursues a career as a pianist and lists among them travel, aviation, gastronomy, oenology, and language. “I am incredibly fortunate to have enjoyed vast experiences in life and an extremely varied education, both in music and otherwise; I hope to draw from my expressive, emotional and intellectual capacity, to project an artistic voice and create unique experiences that resonate with our audiences of today.”

The winners: Evren Ozel, Vitaly Starikov and Aristo Sham

From its origins in 1962 through today, The Cliburn has remained dedicated to sharing music with the largest international audience possible and to launching the careers of its winners. Known for excellence and innovation in the digital space, the Cliburn is one of the most-watched events in classical music: views over the past four years have topped 100 million across 200 countries.

The Cliburn is a proven catalyst to significant worldwide touring careers for its winners, with a laureate roster that—in the past 25 years alone—includes Olga Kern, Joyce Yang, Haochen Zhang, Nobuyuki Tsujii, Yeol Eum Son, Vadym Kholodenko, Beatrice Rana, Yekwon Sunwoo, and Yunchan Lim, besides its 2025 winners Aristo Sham, Vitaly Starikov and Evren Ozel.

This track record of success brings an elite group of 18- to 30-year-old pianists to Fort Worth every four years to compete for the coveted medals. The total Cliburn prize package is worth an estimated $2 million and includes comprehensive and personalized career management, concert bookings, artistic support, and bolstered publicity efforts.


Winners:
First Prize: Aristo Sham, 29, Hong Kong
Second Prize: Vitaly Starikov, 30, Yekaterinburg
Evren Ozel, 26, Minneapolis

Jury: 
Paul Lewis (Chair), Till Fellner, Mari Kodama, Anne-Marie McDermott, Gabriela Montero, Jon Nakamatsu, Lise de la Salle, Yevgeny Sudbin, Wu Han

Artists:
Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra  with Marin Alsop and Carlos Miguel Prieto, Conductors
Gabriela Montero, Composer
 

©WFIMC2025/FR   Photos ©The Cliburn