The Bienen School of Music has awarded pianist Yefim Bronfman the Jean Gimbel Lane Prize in Piano Performance, the school announced Thursday.

As part of the prize, Bronfman will be awarded $50,000 cash and will visit Northwestern for two to three nonconsecutive weeks. During that time, he will teach master classes, present lectures, coach students and give a public concert, said Ellen Schantz, Bienen’s director of communications and marketing.

“The prize is to go to someone of the highest international excellence and reputation,” she said. “The criteria is, ‘Who is the best in the world?'”

While deliberations of the selection committee are not made public, Bronfman meets the criteria, Schantz said.

“You don’t get a higher-ranked person than this,” she said.

Jean Gimbel Lane, WCAS ’52, and her husband established the prize in 2005. It is awarded biennially, Schantz said. Former recipients include pianists Richard Goode and Stephen Hough.

Bronfman will play in Chicago this weekend at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, according to the musician’s Web site. Several NU students went to see him play Thursday night.

“He’s playing one of my favorite concertos,” said Eugenia Jeong, a first-year Bienen graduate student in piano performance.

Jeong, who planned to see Bronfman Thursday, said she had seen the musician perform before and was surprised he was coming to NU.

“He’s such a great artist,” she said. “He’s such a giant in the piano world. I’m really excited.”

Jeong said she would “definitely” audition to play in one of Bronfman’s master classes. Bronfman’s presence on campus represents an opportunity for NU students, Schantz said.

“To see the music world through the eyes of someone of that caliber is no less than astonishing,” she said.[email protected]