Ching Yun Hu

Declared a “first-class talent” and praised for her “poetic use of color and confidently expressive phrasing” (The Philadelphia Inquirer), the distinguished Taiwanese american pianist CHING-YUN HU is recognized and acclaimed worldwide for her dazzling technique, deeply probing musicality, and directly communicative performance style. Ching-Yun Hu’s concert career has flourished with a host of engagements on five continents after winning the top prize at the 12th Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition in Tel Aviv, Israel, where she was also awarded the Audience Favorite Prize.

Immediately after, she was engaged for a seven-city tour across Israel and a special invitation from the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra to perform Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on only a week’s notice. A year later, she won the Concert Artists Guild Competition in New York City. During the 2016 – 2017 season, Ms. Hu gave the world premiere of Yiu-kwong Chung’s Piano Concerto, “The Red Cliff”, with the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia and Dirk Brosse at the Kimmel Center. She recorded “Before the Wresting Tides” by Jeremy Gill for the Boston Modern Orchestra Project with Gil Rose at Boston’s Jordan Hall. Ms. Hu will make her fourth appearance with the Taipei Chinese Orchestra in Taiwan, and return to Germany at the Frankfurt Opera House, as well as the Weilburger Schlosskonzerte, performing Beethoven Concertos No. 1 and 2 with the Staatskapelle Halle. She will perform with the Daejeon Philharmonic Orchestra in South Korea, and will be heard at various recitals and chamber music appearances throughout the United States, Taiwan, and China.

In the 2015-2016 season, Ms. Hu appeared in recitals in New York, Philadelphia, Miami, Tel Aviv, Budapest, and at the Musikmesse Frankfurt. She performed for the gala concert of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra under Jeffrey Kahane. She also soloed with the Wyoming, Bozeman, and Topeka Symphony Orchestras, as well as the Orquestra Petrobras Sinfônica and Orquestra Filarmônica do Espírito Santo in Brazil, Taipei Chinese Orchestra at the Macau International Music Festival, and New York’s Massapequa Philharmonic Orchestra.

Ching-Yun Hu made her debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1999. She has appeared at prestigious concert halls across the globe, including Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Aspen Music Festival, Wigmore Hall and Southbank Centre (London), Salle Cortot (Paris), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Herkulesaal (Munich), Klavier-Ruhr Festival, Franz Liszt Academy of Music (Budapest), Duszniki-Dzroj Chopin International Festival and Rubinstein Philharmonic Hall (Poland), Opera House (Tel Aviv), National Concert Hall (Taipei), and Japan’s Osaka Hall. Ms. Hu is also a frequent guest artist at distinguished music festivals throughout the world. An avid Chopin interpreter, Ching-Yun Hu’s debut recording, an all-Chopin CD released in 2011 on the Taiwanese label ArchiMusic, won Taiwan’s 2012 Golden Melody Award for Best Classical Album of the Year. The fall of 2013 saw the release of her second CD – music of Granados, Mozart and Ravel – on CAG Records.

A native of Taipei, Ms. Hu made her concerto debut at the age of 13 on a tour in Japan and Taiwan. One year later, she moved to the United States to continue her musical studies at The Juilliard School, working with Herbert Stessin. She worked with Sergei Babayan at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and received additional guidance from Karl-Heinz Kammerling in Germany. In addition to performing, Ms. Hu is a keen advocate for the promotion of classical music. She founded the Yun-Hsiang International Music Festival in Taipei in 2012, and the Philadelphia Young Pianists’ Academy (www.pypa.info) in 2013, a piano festival that takes place at the Curtis Institute of Music every summer. Ching-Yun Hu serves on the piano faculty of the Esther Boyer College of Music and Dance at Philadelphia’s Temple University. She is a visiting professor at the Shenzhen Arts School and an honorary artist of the Henan Cultural Center in China. She is supported by the International Piano Forum and German Piano Awards in Frankfurt, Germany. www.chingyunhu.com