Tianwa Yang was born in 1987 in Beijing. She started studying the violin at the age of four. She progressed quickly with her winning six out of the seven violin competitions she entered. In 1997, at the tender age of ten, she was accepted by Professor Lin Yaoji at the Central Conseveratory of Music. By the age of eleven, she had already received many invitations for solo recitals, as well as for concerts with orchestras. Media in Hong Kong described her as “A Pride Of China”. In 1999, after hearing her perform at the 1999 Beijing Music Festival, Isaac Stern praised her talent and invited her to study with him in the USA. In 2000, she became the youngest artist ever worldwide to record the 24 Caprices of Paganini, when she recorded them at the age of 13.
Her European debut was in 2001 in Prague, where she played the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the Czech Broadcasting Symphony Orchestra. In 2003, she played Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in the Munich National Theater with the orchestra of the Bavarian State Opera (Bayerische Staatsoper). Recitals in Paris, Stockholm, Frankfurt and Vienna quickly followed.
In 2003, Tianwa Yang was awarded a special two-year scholarship by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) to study chamber music in Germany. She currently works with Professor Joerg-Wolfgang Jahn in Karlsruhe.
In 2004, Tianwa Yang received the Volkswagen Foundation prize "Star of Tomorrow" from Seiji Ozawa.
In 2005, she performed a recital at the Schwetzingen Festival that was broadcast live by the SWR.
In 2006, Tianwa performed a recital at the Montpellier Festival that was broadcast live by Radio France. In the same year, she was awarded the “PRIX MONTBLANC 2006” and recorded Volume 1 of the complete works of Sarasate (to be released on 7 CDs) for Naxos.
In 2007, Tianwa was invited to perform at the Naxos 20 Year Anniversary concert at Wigmore Hall in London. Recitals in Germany and France, a tour of Germany with Klassisches Philharmonie Bonn (Tchaikovsky Concerto) with concerts in Berlin, Hamburg, Bonn, Stuttgart, Munich, Hannover, Nuernberg, Karlsruhe and Wiesbaden followed. She also recorded Volume 2 of the complete works of Sarasate for Naxos.
2008 proved to be a busy year for Tianwa with recitals at the Berlin Philharmonic Hall and a recording for Deutschland Radio, with more recitals and concerts in Germany. She also recorded Volume 3 of the complete works of Sarasate, followed by a tour of China. She also gave her North-American Debut at the closing concert of the 2008 Virginia Arts Festival with the Virginia Symphony, conducted by JoAnn Falletta. She then went on to record Volume 4 of the complete works of Sarasate with the Pamplona Symphony conducted by Ernest Martinez-Izquierdo.
In October she gave two concerts with the Hong Kong Sinfonietta and appeared with a major American symphony orchestra for the first time, the Detroit Symphony conducted by Gunther Herbig, to unprecedented critical acclaim.
For more information, please visit www.tianwayang.com.
Upcoming Engagements
Bad Neuenahr Klassische Philharmonie Bonn
