ABOUT LISA
Described as “a musical phenomenon” (Pianiste magazine), Yamaha Artist Lisa Yui enjoys a multifaceted musical career as pianist, lecturer, teacher, author, and musical director. Since making her concerto debut at the age of seven, Lisa Yui has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia as a recitalist and soloist with orchestra. She is the top prizewinner of the Senigallia International Piano Competition in Italy, the Super Classics International Auditions in Tokyo, and has twice been the recipient of a Canada Council Scholarship.
Lisa Yui has performed as soloist with prominent orchestras such as the Tokyo Symphony, Polish National Radio, Toronto Symphony, Edmonton Symphony, the Montreal Metropolitan Orchestra, and the Krakow State Philharmonic. Her performances have been broadcast on WQXR (New York), CBC (Canadian Broadcast Corporation), CJRT-FM (Ontario, Canada), and STV (Sapporo, Japan). She has performed in Suntory Hall in Tokyo, Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto, Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, and the Liszt Ferenc Memorial Museum in Budapest, among other major concert venues around the world.
In 2005 Ms. Yui was chosen from over 1000 applicants as one of the few Canadian artists to participate in the World Exposition in Aichi, Japan, where she performed and hosted in English, Japanese, and French. She performed a program of works by Liszt, Ravel, and Canadian composers Francois Morel and Colin McPhee. She has been invited twice to be the featured guest artist on the 101 Days Around the World Tour of the Japanese cruise ship Nipponmaru.
As a lecturer and performer, Ms. Yui originated The Lives of the Piano, Manhattan School of Music’s first piano lecture/concert series, now in its twentieth season. She has been invited as a lecturer to the Juilliard School, Kunitachi Music University, Princeton University, Washington and Lee University, and the University of Toronto, among other universities, colleges and venues. In 2005, Ms. Yui produced a nine-part lecture/concert series in New York, “Beethoven at Yamaha,” in which 30 eminent pianists, including Frederic Rzewski, Frederic Chiu, Jed Distler, Jerome Lowenthal, and Ms. Yui, performed. The following year, she produced “Liszt at Yamaha,” appearing along with 30 guest scholars and artists, among them Alan Walker, Leslie Howard, Thomas Mastroianni, and Jerome Lowenthal. She has performed, lectured and given masterclasses in various music conferences, including the MTNA National Conference and NAMM Show in California.
Lisa Yui has worked extensively with the Yamaha Disklavier, having given numerous performances, including a solo recital of music for four hands, two pianos, and piano and orchestra, as well as long-distance “remote lessons.” A short film on her work with the Disklavier, sponsored by Cisco, was filmed by Jae Choe.
Lisa Yui’s CD of the music of Carl Maria von Weber and Jan Ladislav Dussek was awarded the highest rating, the “Pianiste Maestro,” by the French music magazine, Pianiste. Her DVD/Blu-ray recording of four Beethoven Sonatas with commentary was released on the Aurora Classics label, garnering rave reviews.
Lisa Yui’s insightful writing on music has appeared in numerous publications such as Clavier Companion, EPTA Journal, and Listen, on a variety of topics including the life and influence of the virtuosic 19th-century pianist Marie Pleyel, on whom Dr. Yui wrote her doctoral thesis.
Lisa Yui’s principal teachers and mentors include Byron Janis, Marc Silverman, Giovanni Valentini, Oxana Yablonskaya, Edna Golandsky, David Dubal, Jean-Paul Sevilla and Leonid Hambro. She received her bachelor’s degree at the Juilliard School, where she received the Humanities Award, and her master’s and doctor of musical arts degrees at Manhattan School of Music, which awarded her both the Roy M. Rubinstein Award, given to a graduate with exceptional promise in piano, and the Helen Cohn Award as outstanding doctoral graduate. She has also participated in master classes with Emanuel Ax, Alicia de Larrocha, Conrad Hansen, Leon Fleisher, Eugene Istomin, and Anton Kuerti.
In addition to producing The Lives of the Piano series at Manhattan School of Music, Lisa Yui teaches graduate piano literature, keyboard skills, Historical Recordings of Great Pianists, and The 32 Beethoven Sonatas at Manhattan School of Music, where she is also Associate Dean of Assessment and Academic Programs. She is the recipient of the School’s 2018 President's Medal for Distinguished Service.
Lisa Yui is on the piano faculty at John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University. She was the director of Ensemble 212’s Young Artist Competition Series, has served as department chair of the Music Advancement Program at the Juilliard School, and has taught a course on the social history of the piano at Marymount Manhattan College for many years. Lisa Yui has served as a member of numerous competition juries including the National Finals of the Canadian Music Competition and the Canadian Chopin Competition.
Photo: Jo Liu
TRIVIA
20
NUMBER OF SEASONS OF THE LECTURE PIANO SERIES AT MANHATTAN SCHOOL OF MUSIC, "THE LIVES OF THE PIANO"
4
NUMBER OF YEARS LISA WROTE "FAMILY!" A COMIC STRIP SERIAL FOR A JAPANESE-CANADIAN NEWSPAPER
11
AGE WHEN LISA PERFORMED THE PROKOFIEV CONCERTO NO. 3 WITH THE MONTREAL METROPOLITAN ORCHESTRA
417
NUMBER OF CONTINUOUS MINUTES LISA SPENT ON A WEEKNIGHT WATCHING LOUIS FEUILLADE'S SILENT FILM, "LES VAMPIRES"