Fei-Fei Dong, Piano

Biography

Praised for her ”bountiful gifts and passionate immersion into the music she touches” (The Plain Dealer), Chinese pianist Fei-Fei Dong is a winner of the 2014 CAG Victor Elmaleh Competition and a final-six finalist at the 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. She continues to build a reputation for her poetic interpretations, charming audiences with her “passion, piquancy and tenderness” and “winning stage presence” (Dallas Morning News).

Ms. Dong’s Spring 2015 calendar features the Cliburn’s Chopin Festival in Fort Worth and concerto engagements with the Austin Symphony, Fort Collins Symphony and the Denver Philharmonic orchestras.  Her summer festival appearances in 2015 include Bravo! Vail Valley, the Highlands Chamber Music and Lake George Music Festivals.  She is also showcased prominently in the new documentary film about the 2013 Cliburn Competition, Virtuosity, which will premiere on PBS on July 31.

Her burgeoning career includes a number of prominent engagements in the 2015-16 season, including New York City debut recitals at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall (CAG Winners Series), and at Merkin Concert Hall (Tuesday matinee series).  Additional featured recitals include the Gilmore Rising Stars Series in Kalamazoo, MI, and St. Vincent College Concert series near Pittsburgh, where she will receive the Father Joseph Bronder Memorial Piano Prize.  Concerto engagements in 15-16 include the Lexington (KY) and Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic orchestras.

Ms. Dong has performed at Alice Tully Hall in recital as the winner of Juilliard’s 33rd Annual William Petscheck Recital Award and as a soloist with the Juilliard Orchestra under the baton of Jeffrey Kahane. She has appeared as a soloist with the Aspen Music Festival Orchestra, Corpus Christi Symphony, Fort Worth Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Hudson Valley Philharmonic, and the Shanxi, Shenzhen, and Youngstown Symphony Orchestras, working with conductors such as Leonard Slatkin, Randall Craig Fleisher, and John Giordano. Notable recitals include those at Warsaw Philharmonic Concert Hall and the Louvre, and she has been featured numerous times on New York’s WQXR radio.

She is a member of the Aletheia Piano Trio, which debuted at the Kennedy Center in February 2014 as part of its Conservatory Project. Deeply committed to sharing her joy in music and connecting with communities, she also engages students and audiences through school and outreach concerts and master classes.

Born in Shenzhen, China, Ms. Dong began piano lessons at the age of 5. She moved to New York to study at The Juilliard School, where she earned her Bachelor and Master of Music degrees under the guidance of Yoheved Kaplinsky.