The Cogen Concerto Competition was established by the Board of Trustees of Levine Music in 1983 to honor Ruth Cogen, one of the school’s founders and its first chair of the Board of Trustees.
The 2026 Competition took place on Sunday, February 8, 2026. Each participant prepared one movement from a concerto or solo piece intended for performance with an orchestra for the preliminary round. Students in the final round performed with piano accompaniment. One grand prize winner was chosen from all the first-place division winners to play in an upcoming performance accompanied by an orchestra.
Awards
Congratulations to all the finalists and their extraordinary teachers!
Grand Prize Winners:
Neel Perdue, student of Martin Labazevitch, and Chloe Robertson, student of Jimmy Ren
Piano Senior Division
Second place: Anastasia Fitenko, student of Martin Labazevitch; Minjae Jeon, student of Jinha Park
Honorable mention: Pamina Burton, student of Cecilia Cho
Piano Intermediate Division
First place: Neel Perdue, student of Martin Labazevitch
Second place: Pietro Magistretti, student of Martin Labazevitch
Instrumental Senior Division
First place: Chloe Robertson, student of Jimmy Ren
Second place: Aden Garland, student of Leo Sushansky
Honorable mentions: Juniper Brinegar, student of Paul Cigan; Zoie Chu, student of Britton Riley
Instrumental Intermediate Division
First place: Felix Karacsony-Major, student of Claire Eichhorn
Second place: Chloe Chu, student of Virgilio Joven
Honorable mentions: Liem Do, student of Annabelle Berthomé-Reynolds; Jerome Amon, student of Henry Stubbs
Combined Junior Division
First place: Zoey Clowes, student of Amanda Halstead
Second place: Mirei Araki, student of Sayaka Jordan
Honorable mentions: Faith Reyes, student of Amanda Halstead; Nolan Li, student of Inga Liu
Congratulations to all the participants, their teachers, and their families!
Jinha Park, competition organizer; Darya Gabay and Irina Kats, collaborative pianists; Chad R. Bowles, Jaewon Kim, Jeffrey Solow, and Steven Spooner, competition judges; and Levine campus staff.
This program has been made possible through the generous support of the Marinus and Minna B. Koster Foundation, Inc.