The 2024 Walter Prystawski Prize

We are pleased to announce that this year’s Walter Prystawski Prize is awarded to 20-year-old pianist Ryan Zhu, from Vancouver, BC.

Judged the top contender in this year’s competition, Ryan has been awarded the 2024 Walter Prystawski Prize in addition to his Sylva Gelber award. Jury members were seized with his facility and artistry, calling his playing “next level.”

Ryan has been studying the piano for sixteen years, appearing across many concert stages with a broad range of repertoire. One of CBC Music’s “30 Under 30 Hot Canadian Classical Musicians” in 2021, he won second place at the Juilliard School’s Mieczyslaw Munz Piano Competition in 2022.

Winner of Juilliard’s 2023 Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, Ryan was featured in the gala concert in September of that year, broadcast on the classical music station WQXR; as the competition winner, he received a full tuition scholarship for the 2023-24 academic year. Ryan was also a semi-finalist in the 2023 Young Concert Artists Susan Wadsworth International Auditions. In February of 2023, Ryan was named the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra’s Emerging Young Artist, performing with Charles Richard Hamelin and the Philharmonic. In September 2024, he will be competing in the Leeds International Piano Competition as one of the twenty-four competitors, and in the Hamamatsu International Piano Competition in November.

Ryan has attended various festivals, most notably the Four Seasons Chamber Music Festival Spring Workshop in 2023; the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival in 2022; the 2021 Morningside Music Bridge Young Artists Festival, taking second place in the concerto competition; and the 13th Mariinsky International Piano Festival in 2018, where he was featured in a solo recital as well as a soloist with the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra.

Ryan has won numerous other prizes at the Thomas and Evon Cooper International Piano Competition, the Philadelphia International Piano Competition, the Canadian Music Competitions, and the Vancouver Academy of Music Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition. Over the years, he has appeared as a soloist in cities such as St. Petersburg, Nice, Lucerne, Philadelphia, Vancouver, Salt Lake City, and Los Angeles.

In addition to collaborating with the Calgary Philharmonic and Mariinsky Theatre orchestras, Ryan has performed with the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra, the Vancouver Academy of Music Symphony Orchestra, the Richmond Orchestra, the Lions Gate Sinfonia, and the West Coast Symphony.

Ryan is currently pursuing his undergraduate degree with Robert McDonald and Stephen Hough at the Juilliard School. He has previously studied with Mira Yevtich, Michelle Mares, Kenneth Broadway, and Ralph Markham.

Ryan Zhu gratefully acknowledges the support of the Sylva Gelber Music Foundation toward living and career-development costs in the year ahead.