Dr. Ann Wu, NCTM
Ann Wu began her musical studies at the age of four in her native Taiwan where she was a prize winner in several national piano competitions. Wu received her DMA in Piano Performance and Literature from UIUC, her MM from the University of Cincinnati, and her BM from the Peabody Conservatory of The Johns Hopkins University.
Wu has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia as a solo recitalist and chamber musician. As an active adjudicator and clinician, she not only has adjudicated numerous music competitions, but also served on the piano faculty at the Peabody Preparatory and Valencia College. She currently serves as adjunct professor of Piano at West Valley College and directs her piano studio in Sunnyvale, California.
Master Class Instructors
Master Class will be awarded to Winners
Dr. Sophiko Simsive - Guest Artist
A dedicated educator, Sophiko Simsive serves as a Senior Coaching Assistant at Yale University while also maintaining a piano studio at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music.
A native of Georgia, Sophiko holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Manhattan School of Music.
Sophiko is an internationally acclaimed pianist, praised by Jean-Yves Thibaudet as “a rare talent who promises to become one of the leading pianists of her generation.” Known for her expressive yet personal artistry, She has appeared at renowned venues including Carnegie Hall, Based in New York, Sophiko frequently performs with New Chamber Ballet. She is a founding member of Trio Phōs, whose interdisciplinary project The Sound of Connection, supported by
the 2024 New World Symphony BLUE Grant explores intergenerational storytelling through music, dance, and conversation.
Dr. TianYi Li
Dr. Li is a Secondary Piano instructor at the Juilliard School,
a Postgraduate Teaching Fellow at the New School for Music Study. He earned Master of Music degree and Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Juilliard School. Dr. Li is the recipient of the third prize, alongside prizes for best performance of a semifinal recital, best performance of romantic works, and best performance of a Scarlatti Sonata at the 2017 Tbilisi International Piano Competition, the sixth prize at the 2024 Xiamen International Piano Competition, and a two-time Bowdoin International Music Festival piano fellow in 2022 and 2024. As a soloist, he has given recitals in the United States, Europe, and China. Recent highlights include a concert at the Oracle Piano Society in Arizona and the complete Rachmaninoff Études-Tableaux at the Shanghai International Piano Festival & Institute. As a chamber musician, he has performed with the New Juilliard Ensemble and AXIOM in Alice Tully Hall, Peter Jay Sharp Theater, and at the Metropolitan Opera Club.
Lyndon Ji, MM
Lyndon Ji is a candidate for the Doctor of Musical Arts at the Yale School of Music under the guidance of Wei-Yi Yang. Previously, he completed his Artist Diploma (IU Jacobs School of Music) and Master of Music (University of Michigan) with Roberto Plano and Logan Skelton, respectively. He pursued Mathematics (B.S.) as an undergraduate at Yale and served as a Swensen Fellow, studying piano additionally with Elizabeth Parisot and Wei-Yi Yang.
In recent seasons, he has performed at the Gijón Piano Festival, American Matthay Association, American Liszt Society, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Masterclasses, Bowdoin International Music Festival (Fellowship), Norfolk New Music Workshop, and the Mozarteum Summer Academy. His numerous awards include the Grand Prize and Baroque Prize at the 2023 Chicago International Music Competition. Outside of music, Lyndon enjoys brewing coffee in all forms, cooking, and watching the joint antics of his wife and two cats.
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Dr. Kyunghoon Kim
Dr. Kim graduated as valedictorian from Seoul National University with his B.M. in piano performance, and went on to pursue his M.M. and D.M. studies in Indiana University under the guidance of Arnaldo Cohen. He has won top prizes at many piano competitions in the United States, and has performed as a soloist with orchestras in South Korea, Vietnam, and U.S., including two appearances with the Indiana University Symphony Orchestra as the winner of Jacobs School of Music concerto competitions. He is an active collaborative pianist, educator, and composer/arranger. He also runs a YouTube channel where he performs his original arrangements of classical, jazz, and pop songs with his pianist wife.
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Dr. Peng Krol
Dr. Peng Du is an assistant professor of piano and the academic lead
at Dalian Art College, China. She earned both the Artist Diploma and the
Doctor of Musical Arts degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign, with the support of the Longford Fellowship and the full-
scholarship at UIUC. Her doctoral project focuses on the humorous
dimensions of Beethoven’s piano variations, her recent publication includes the article “The Whimsical Character of Beethoven’s Salieri Piano Variations” in Beethoven the European: Transcultural Contexts of Performance, Interpretation and Reception by BREPOLS. Her research has been applauded by Professor Kinderman of UCLA as “her study shed a revealing new light on these remarkable yet somewhat neglected works.
Dr. Du served as the coordinator and the principle instructor of the
Piano Laboratory Program at UIUC, the collaborative pianist at Carroll
University (Wisconsin), and the piano instructor at Harper College (IL).
