About the win

Yundi Li won the fourteenth edition in 2000, restoring the first prize after two editions without one. At eighteen he was the youngest winner to that date and the first Chinese pianist to take the title.

Key facts

• First first-prize winner since 1985, after the blank editions of 1990 and 1995.
• The youngest winner up to that point, aged eighteen.
• First Chinese pianist to win the Chopin Competition.
• Signed to Deutsche Grammophon and became a major star in China.