Young Artist Competition 2025

Hailed as "lively and sensational” by Montreal’s Arts and Opinion, and “flawless” by New York Concert Review, prize-winning violinist Iryna Krechkovsky enjoys an international career as soloist, chamber music collaborator, educator, and arts executive. She has appeared on Classical KUSC, KABC-TV Los Angeles, the Korean Broadcasting System, National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting Service, and as a speaker/performer at TEDxChapmanU. Born in Ukraine, Iryna Krechkovsky attended the Cleveland Institute of Music and holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Stony Brook University in New York where she was awarded the distinguished 40 Under Forty Alumni Award. She is Co-Founder and Executive Director of Chamber Music | OC where she curates the nationally recognized Pre-College Program, and is a founding member of the award-winning ensemble Trio Céleste with cellist Ross Gasworth and pianist Kevin Kwan Loucks.

Hailed by the New York Times as "technically brilliant, insightful musician and seemingly limitless potential", Hong Xu is one of China's most accomplished pianists of his generation. He has played with world renowned conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenzy, Mikhail Pletnev, Yannick Nezét- Seguin, Sir Mark Elder, Yan Pascal Totelier, Hans Graf, Markus Stenz and Robert Spano.

Graduated from the Eastman School of Music and The Juilliard School, he won prizes at the Bachauer, Hilton Head and Honens International Piano Competitions.

He is currently an associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen), School of Music.

Yi-Yang Chen shot onto the international stage with consecutive victories at the 2018 Sussex International Piano Competition, the 2017 Washington International Piano Competition, and the Waring International Piano Competition. A native of Taipei, Taiwan, Chen holds a Bachelor of Music and Master of Music from The Eastman School of Music and The Juilliard School, where he studied with Douglas Humphreys, Robert McDonald, and Jerome Lowenthal. His solo and chamber music mentors include Itzhak Perlman, Emanuel Ax, and members of the Shanghai, Cleveland, and Guarneri String Quartets. Chen currently serves as an Associate Professor of Piano at the University of Kansas. Chen has performed on five continents in renowned venues, including Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center in New York, the Melbourne Recital Centre, National Concert Hall in Taipei, Banff Music Centre in Canada, ZK Matthews Great Hall in South Africa, and the Assembly Hall in Worthing, UK. He has appeared as a soloist with the Worthing Symphony Orchestra, Brevard Music Center Orchestra, Avanti Orchestra, Eastman Philharmonic Orchestra, National Chinese Orchestra, and the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra. Chen is a Steinway Artist.

Flautist and conductor Jean Ferrandis enjoys an international career that takes him throughout Europe, Asia, and North America. He has presented recitals, performed chamber music, and appeared as soloist with orchestra in such prestigious concert halls as the Salle Pleyel and Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris, Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Tapei Arts Center, Wigmore Hall in London, La Fenice in Venice, Hamarikyu Hall in Tokyo, the Vigado in Budapest, the Palau de la Musica Catalana in Barcelona, and the Moscow Tschaikovsky Conservatory, under such conductors as Leonard Bernstein, Tibor Varga, Laurent Petitgirard, and Yoram David. He has been invited to numerous festivals, including the Lanaudière in Canada, Switzerland's Sion Festival, the Budapest Spring Festival, the Midem Festival in Cannes, and the Berlioz Festival in Lyon. Chamber music collaborators have included Gidon Kremer, Ivry Gitlis, Jean Philippe Collard, and Emile Naoumoff. His appearances at the 2006 National Flute Association convention in Pittsburgh, an event attended by three thousand flutists, included a gala headliner concert in Heinz Hall and a master class. Jean Ferrandis currently teaches at l'Ecole Normale in Paris and at California State University-Fullerton.

Suejin Jung is a Korean-American concert pianist and multimedia artist praised for her “exhilarating, alternately mysterious… profound, contemplative playing” (Opus Klassiek) and for “stepping outside the box -artistically and personally” (Goodmesh). She has performed internationally with Ensemble Calliopée, the Ruse Philharmonic, Rutgers Symphony, and The Discovery Orchestra, and at series and festivals including Tuesdays@Monk Space, Laguna Beach Live, Écoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau, Music Academy International and April in Santa Cruz with broadcasts on PBS, NPO Klassiek and the Strad. She co-founded MIMA to support collaborative art-making and the education of young musicians. Jung teaches at the Montecito International Music Festival, has taught at Drew University and Rutgers University, has given masterclasses and performances at UC Irvine, Cal State Riverside and Fullerton, Seoul Arts High School, Chamber Music | OC, and serves on the board of the Music Teachers’ Association of California. She studied at Juilliard, École Normale de Musique de Paris as a Harriet Hale Woolley Scholar, and completed her doctorate at Rutgers University.

Mari Kimura is a violinist/composer, entrepreneur, and a leading figure in interactive computer music. She is world-renowned for Subharmonics—the production of pitches that sound up to an octave below the violin’s lowest string—and her dynamic performances as an interpreter as well as an improviser. She received numerous awards including the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Fromm Commission Award from Harvard University, a residency award at IRCAM in Paris, and from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Educated at Toho School of Music, Boston University and The Juilliard School, Mari is a Professor of Music at UC Irvine and at Juilliard. In 2017, She developed a motion sensor prototype MUGIC®, a small WIFI device which can be worn as a ‘wearable tech’ or attached to objects. Commercialized in 2020, MUGIC® is now used by musicians, artists and beyond and in numerous conservatories and universities around the world such as Harvard, Juilliard, Univ. of Toronto and University of Arts in Berlin. As an entrepreneur, Mari received the Certificate of Recognition from the House of Representatives and the California State Assembly in 2020. She’s a co-founder of MIMA.