Jialin Yao
Jialin Yao, piano
Pianist Jialin Yao has been hailed for his “mature, sensitive and polished playing with serious attitude towards music making and a strong mindset for interpretive details” (Dmitri Alexeev), and he is increasingly recognized for his “natural musicianship as well as his very sophisticated technical skills” (Michel Béroff). His love of bringing warmth, passion, and magic to audiences has led to performances throughout North America, Asia, and Europe. Being a multi-dimensional musician, Jialin Yao not only appears on the stage as a chamber musician and collaborator, but is also committed to piano teaching. Currently, he is serving as secondary piano course teacher and college staff pianist at the Juilliard School. He is a firm believer that the most moving music can only come from the most open-hearted and truthful human beings.
As a soloist, Jialin Yao is an avid interpreter of a wide range of repertoire. He has performed piano concertos with the Boulder Symphony, Friuli Venezia Giulia Orchestra, Miami Chamber Orchestra, Wuhan Philharmonic Orchestra, and Orchestra Academia China, among others. He also performed Mingxin Du’s Piano Concerto No.1 ‘The Elegance of Spring’ with En Shao and Orchestra Academia China in Peking University Hall, which was praised by the composer for Jialin Yao’s ability to bring fresh energy and liveliness to the piece. In the same season, he also performed Mozart’s No.21 Piano Concerto in C K.467 with En Shao and Orchestra Academia China for members of the National Committee in the great hall of China Conservatory, which turned out to be a great success and won tremendous acclaim. In 2018, as a distinguished artist of KNS Classical, Jialin Yao released his first album, Campanella, featuring works including Beethoven, Liszt, Scriabin, Ravel, and Kapustin.
His 2023-2024 season highlights include two nights sold out performances of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.3 with Boulder Symphony conducted by Devin Patrick Hughes.
Jialin Yao has been a Prize-winner in numerous competitions such as the Friuli Venezia Giulia International Piano Competition, the Teresa Carreño Master Piano Competition, the IKOF International Piano Competition, the Singapore International Piano Competition, the Steinway National Competition, the Shigeru Kawai International Piano Competition, the Santa Cecilia International Piano Competition, and many others. Jialin Yao has been invited to perform at today’s most prestigious music festivals such as PianoFest in New York, Gilmore Festival in Kalamazoo, and Verbier Festival in Switzerland.
A sensitive and keen chamber musician, Jialin Yao has a wide chamber music repertoire and has performed at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Cente S.Rose Studio “Sunday Evenings at Klavierhaus”, and Église de Verbier Station. His chamber music mentors include Emanuel Ax, Jerome Lowenthal, Molly Carr, Natasha Brofsky, Ronald Copes, Joseph Lin, Ida Kavafian, Augustin Dumay, Gábor Takács-Nagy, Mihaela Martin, and Mathieu Herzog. Jialin’s collaborators include Tarn Travers, Jaewon Wee, Jack Kessler, Stephanie Huang, and Quartets Academia China. In 2022, Jialin and his VIA piano trio were selected for the Juilliard Honors Chamber Music program. With the VIA trio, he has played music by Mozart, Dvorak, and Ravel.
Jialin Yao is also an outstanding concert organizer. In high school, he established his own orchestra and performed the Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto. In 2014, he served as associate music director of the “Training Day” ensemble, leading performances of Les Miserables and Notre Dame de Paris across China, including Beijing Tianqiao Performing Arts Center. He also organized and performed a live concert for the opening ceremony of the photographic exhibition Audrey Hepburn in Beijing.
Jialin Yao was born in China in 1999. He began to play piano at the age of 4. In 2011 Jialin Yao entered the China Conservatory of Music in Beijing where he studied with Hong Fu. Since 2020, he received guidance from pianist Ruoyu Huang. After finishing his bachelor’s degree in China, Jialin Yao moved to the United States to earn his Master’degree at the Juilliard School in New York, where he studied with Sergei Babayan. Now he is continuing his studies with Mr. Babayan at Southern Methodist University pursuing an Artist Diploma.
