Cover Aristo Sham, the first Hongkonger to win the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
Aristo Sham, the first Hongkonger to win the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
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In June, Aristo Sham became the first Hongkonger to win the coveted Van Cliburn International Competition. Now, he has returned to Asia to share his love of classical music.
Classical musicians rarely make headlines. But two months ago, witnessed by 2 million online viewers from around the world, pianist Aristo Sham emerged as a media favourite. He became the first Hongkonger to win the Van Cliburn International Competition in Texas in early June, a classical music contest widely considered as one of the most prestigious and toughest; this year’s edition took place over a gruelling three weeks, with each candidate playing a total of six programmes that added up to about four and a half hours of playing each.
Sham’s victory in such a renowned international competition has certainly made his home town proud—and the musician, who now spends most of his time in New York, has been blown away by the reaction. “I never imagined such enthusiastic support from friends in Hong Kong,” he says. “I’m very moved by the support and attention, and I hope everyone can continue to support me and classical music.”
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Above Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
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This month, he will kick-start his Winner’s Asian Tour in Hong Kong—he was previously invited to perform at the city’s National Day Concert on July 1 and received a hero’s welcome home. The tour, which will take him across Asia, is part of the prize he received for winning the Cliburn; it also included a cash award of US$100,000 (about HK$800,000).
Speaking by video call from New York a week after the competition, Sham recalled his experience. “The hardest part was getting through these four and a half hours of music and quickly moving from one round to the next,” he says. The pianist chose masterpieces by a wide range of composers: Bach, Ravel, Montero, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Mozart and Beethoven. “[I wanted to] show a different side of myself in each of the six rounds. Each round felt like a different world. Switching from one to another was quite difficult and it required complete focus, which was extremely hard. But I think that’s one of the purposes of the competition: to see if we can do it.” It was so strenuous that Sham had to take a full day off after the second round. “It was impossible to think or continue practising. I decided that taking a day off would make my subsequent work better. This competition really [tested] our stamina.”
Above Aristo Sham’s hands on the keyboard (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
Aristo Sham’s hands on the keyboard (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
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Born to a piano teacher mother and tutorial centre physics teacher father, Sham started learning the piano at three and was competing and performing by the age of ten. He also attended concerts and masterclasses from a young age, and describes Hong Kong as a culturally rich place with “many high-quality concerts and teachers”.
The 29-year-old’s CV highlights his success at some of the most respected piano competitions around the world, including first prizes at the Ettlingen International Piano Competition in 2006, the Gina Bachauer International Junior Piano Competition in 2008 and the Monte Carlo Music Masters in 2023. In 2009, he was featured on the British TV series The World’s Greatest Musical Prodigies.
Despite his achievements, Sham never puts these labels and markers of success above his interests—in fact, he didn’t make a conscious decision to focus solely on the piano.
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Above Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
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After attending boarding school at Britain’s famed Harrow School, he headed to the US for a dual degree: economics at Harvard and piano performance at the New England Conservatory—a decision, he explains, that was made based on his varied interests which, these days, also include travelling and learning languages.
While Sham acknowledges the benefits of being exposed to the French, German or Russian schools of piano playing, he doesn’t believe it is necessary for a young Hong Kong musician to going abroad to train. “If you want to chase your dream, find a teacher who is suitable for you or clicks with you,” he says, “That’s how you can truly achieve the highest level of art and music.” Sham was a student of local pianist Eleanor Wong at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts before he moved to London for school. “Without her guidance, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Besides technique, what she taught me was musical thinking and structural education, which are very important to me. I still use her ideas and lessons now.”
Above Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
Aristo Sham (Photo: Tatler Hong Kong)
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Over time, Sham has found that he is less concerned with relying on his gift to achieve technical brilliance and more interested in “searching within myself to see how much everything I’ve learnt and been exposed to can be reflected in my music”.
The Cliburn, he adds, is “an endgame competition. This is one of the moments my entire life has been building up to.” There’s a double meaning here: the competition is open to those aged 18 to 30, so it was his last shot; but more importantly, he feels it is a competition that sets the winner up for life, providing them with the resources to expand their music career on a global scale.
And for Sham, that starts with returning to Asia, where he hasn’t had many chances to perform, for a tour. He describes himself as “extremely happy” to be able to share his music with audiences worldwide. “But also,” he says, “I am very happy that [my win] puts Hong Kong on the [global] cultural map and that we can produce artists on this level for the world stage.”
Credits
Photography: Zed Leets
Photography Assistant: Carlos Hui
Grooming: Kit Li
Location: Ella
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Zabrina is the Senior Editor, Arts and Culture of Tatler Hong Kong. She specialises in performing arts, visual art and film. Her wanderlust was first fuelled by the Mighty Rovers Antarctica Expedition 2010. Over the years, she has interviewed A-list artists and filmmakers, including Oscar winners Chlóe Zhao and Tim Yip, Golden Horse winner Sylvia Chang, In the Mood for Love cinematographer Christopher Doyle, Pachinko author Min Jin Lee, and Coachella’s first Chinese solo singer Jackson Wang. She won gold at the WAN-IFRA Asian Media Awards for her 2021 feature on the waves of hate crimes targeting Asian Americans.
