When Jeonghwan Kim was announced the winner of The Sydney International Piano Competition for 2023, taking out the $50,000 prize, Artistic Director Piers Lane described him as a “very complete pianist and artist”.

Sydney International Piano Competition Winner Jeonghwan Kim. Photo supplied

And the Korean-born 23-year-old had the chance to show his considerable wares to Australian audiences in his debut national tour of six cities.

Kim started playing piano at six and moved with his family to Berlin to live at the age of 11. He just turned 23 while the Preliminary rounds were taking place.

Lane was lavish in his praise of the young pianist who topped the field of 32 international up-and-comers. “His virtuosity is astounding, his accuracy in the most complex passages breathtaking. He’s got it all,” he said.

There was certainly plenty of diversity in this triumphal tour with the first half comprising two sonatas that couldn’t be further apart in Beethoven’s affectionately nostalgic and joyful Les Adieux and Prokofiev’s unsettling and uncompromising No. 6 in A Major, the first of his three monumental “war sonatas”.

That Kim could carry this startling contrast off with such aplomb...