Since his concerto debut at the age of 16 with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Taiwanese-American pianist Brian Hsu has gone on to establish himself a pianist of great energy and unusual communicative ability. Critics have described his performances in surperlatives, noting his “breadth of expression and technical ability.”

 

An experienced performer, Mr. Hsu has performed throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and South Africa. US performances include Boston, New York, Chicago, New Orleans, Dallas, as well as many others. He has appeared as concerto soloist with such ensembles as the Philadelphia Orchestra, Taiwan National Symphony, Juilliard Orchestra, Haddonfield Symphony, Sendai Philharmonic, and University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra. He has also been a guest on WQXR radio station in New York several times. Mr. Hsu has performed in various music festivals including Amalfi Coast Music Festival in Italy; Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Michigan; Gijon International Piano Festival in Spain; Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina; Banff Festival of the Arts in Canada; PianoFest in The Hamptons in Long Island, New York. His US debut solo recording, Night at the opera: Part I, which consist of opera transcriptions for solo piano, was released in the fall of 2018. In addition to his competition successes, Mr. Hsu was the recipient of numerous awards while attending Juilliard, Yale, and Michigan. 

 

Mr. Hsu frequently appears as a guest artist/teacher, presenter, and jury member in various Music Teachers National Association contests and other major competitions, such as the New Orleans International Piano Competition, Nanyang Academy of the Arts in Singapore. He often performs and has taught masterclasses at various colleges and universities throughout the United States and Asia. An avid chamber musician and collaborator, Mr. Hsu continuously performs with colleagues throughout the music world. Mr. Hsu participated in the world premiere of Paul Schoenfeld’s Piano Quintet with members of the Pro Arte’s Quartet, and in the spring of 2014, a recording was released by Albany Records. Along with voice alumni of Loyola University New Orleans, Mr. Hsu participated in the debut of Logan Skeleton’s Letters to Santa in 2016. As a member of the piano trio, Ensemble Peri, he participated in its inaugural tour which took place in Korea during the summer of 2019. Mr. Hsu is also a founding member of Key 2 Inclusion, an intercollegiate initiative to promote and teach piano music written by African-American and other minority composers.

 

Mr. Hsu served as a staff accompanist at Yale University and University of Michigan, staff accompanist and chamber music coach at Eastern Music Festival, piano faculty at the McAlester Institute in Oklahoma, piano faculty at Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Michigan. He has served as schedule coordinator, staff pianist, faculty, and assistant to the director at Amalfi Coast Music Festival in Italy. He was also an adjunct professor at Siena Heights University and taught at the Ann Arbor School for the Performing Arts. 

 

Mr. Hsu’s primary piano professors include Logan Skelton, Peter Frankl, Jerome Lowenthal, Yoheved Kaplinsky, Wha-Kyung Byun, and John Kuo. He has won awards in numerous competitions, both in the US and Asia, including Wideman Competition, Corpus Christi International Young Artists’ Competition, Juilliard’s Gina Bachauer, National Piano Competition in Taiwan. Additional studies have been with Da-Ming Zhu, Paul Schenly, Marc Durand, Arthur Greene. He received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from The Juilliard School, Artist Diploma from Yale University, Doctoral of Musical Arts degree from the University of Michigan. He is currently associate professor of piano at the University of Oregon. Prior to Oregon, he was the associate professor at Loyola University New Orleans.