Dongkyu Leo Kim

DONGKYU LEO KIM, piano
Dongkyu Leo Kim was born 1994 in Seoul, South Korea. At the age of 4 he received his first piano lessons and began his artistic training at the Korea National University of Arts, with Prof. Choong Mo Kang. Kim continued his studies at the Berlin University of the Arts with Prof. Elena Lapitskaja, took regularly private lessons with Prof. Wolfgang Manz (Nuremberg) and finished his Master studies in 2020 with Prof. Lucas Blondeel. He is currently studying at the Hochschule für Musik Johannes-Gutenberg, University Mainz, working with Prof. Thomas Hell to finish his “Konzertexamen”.

Kim’s repertoire spans a wide range, from Johann Sebastian Bach to the present. Music from Late Romanticism and Early Modernism is particularly close to his heart, with a focus on Viennese composers (Brahms, Haydn) and the Catalan Piano School (Albéniz, Granados). He is also interested to combine Korean Music with Classical Western Music. Furthermore he realizes cross-over projects with performance artists (2020 at the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz with music by Stefan Wolpe), writers (like Christian Filips) and discovers unknown composers. He has premiered pieces by the Viennese composer Adalbert von Goldschmidt and Emília Miret i Soler, among others. Dongkyu Leo Kim plays regularly at renowned piano competitions, most recently at the Prague Spring Festival, in Sendai and Geneva.

In 2020 and 2021 he won several prizes, including 1st awards at the International Music Competition in Vancouver, at the Danubia Competition in Budapest, in Ischia, and San Donà di Piave, the Gold Hands Awards at the Carles & Sofia International Piano Competition in Girona, as well as prizes at the Neapolitan Masters Competition and the Svjatoslav Richter Competition in Seoul (including the Audience Prize and the Baroque Prize).

Since 2021 Dongkyu Leo Kim teaches as a lecturer for piano at the Hochschule für Musik Johannes-Gutenberg, University Mainz. In December 2021 the German radio SWR2 broadcasted an interview with him and his recordings of the Iberia Suite by Albéniz.

With this album he makes his debut as a piano soloist.