Born in Hungary in 1981, Gábor Farkas studied at the Béla Bartók Conservatorium in Miskolc. From 1999 until 2006 he studied at the Franz Liszt Music Academy in Budapest. He won first prize at the National Piano Competition in Békés-Tarhos (Hungary), the Béla Bartók Piano Competition in Austria and the National Hungarian Radio Piano Competition in Budapest. The 28 year old has already performed in the Rachmaninov Concert Hall in Moscow, the Berlin Konzerthaus as well as in Calgary, Paris, Helsinki, Tokyo, Bratislava, Budapest und Vienna. He also performed at the International Piano Forum in Berlin, the Dorset Music Festival in Great Britain as well as at the Musicathlon Festival in Peking. He has worked with conductors like Adam Fischer, Zoltán Kocsis and András Ligeti.

During his 13 years on stage, Oleksandr (Alex) Poliykov performed as soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine, the Kiev Philharmonic Orchestra and the Cherigov Philharmonic Orchestra. Born in 1988 in Kiew (Ukraine), he also performed in Poland, Slovakia, Russia, Germany, Austria, Italy and the USA. In 2008 he was a guest performer at the Music Festival Perugia in Italy. He won the third prize at the New England International Chamber Music Competition (2008) as well as the first prize at the Steinway Society Competition of Massachusetts (2008). He studied at the National Tschaikowsky Music Academy in Kiew with Prof. Boris Arkhimovich and Prof. Tatiana Roschina. He has been studying with Prof. Michael Lewin at the Boston Conservatory in Massachusetts since 2007.

The 15 year old Lin Zi Pan is the youngest participant of the competition. Born in 1994 in Wuhan City in China, she received her first lessons at the age of 5. 4 years later she received lessons from Prof. Dan Zhaoyi at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music. As a member of the Shenzhen Young Genius Pianists Group she toured through 15 Chinese cities as well as Canada and the USA in 2005. Lin Zi Pan has been performing regularly as soloist and chamber musician since 2006. At the invitation of the European Piano Teachers Association she performed in 2007 in Portugal, 2008 in Poland and in Serbia. There she performed the Grieg Piano Concerto with the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra. She has received numerous prizes at competitions, including the first prize at the Toyama Asian Youth Music Competition 2009.