On Saturday’s live broadcast, we feature 16-year-old pianist Ashley Kim, a junior at New Trier High School. Ashley is a scholarship fellow at the Music Institute of Chicago’s Academy, a training center for advanced pre-college musicians. She studies piano with Northwestern Bienen School of Music Professor James Giles and Dr. Matt Hagle. She has performed in many renowned venues including Carnegie Hall, Studebaker Theater, and Miller Theater.
Ashley was selected as one of eight finalists and was the recipient of the Audience Favorite award for “The Most Moving Performance of a Mozart Concerto” at the MostArts Festival in New York. As a result, she had the opportunity to play with the MostArts Festival Orchestra in the Miller Theater. Ashley also was an award winner in the open senior division at the Walgreens National Concerto Competition in 2018, the Crain-Maling Foundation Chicago Symphony Orchestra Young Artists Competition in 2018, and the DePaul Concerto Competition in 2017.
In 2017, Ashley was awarded second prize at the Emilio Del Rosario Concerto Competition, where she was featured on WFMT’s Introductions and performed her debut with an orchestra. She won first prize at the Sejong Music Competition in both the junior and senior divisions where she also received the best interpretation award. She was also the first prize winner of the Society of American Musicians Competition in both the junior and intermediate divisions in 2015 and 2016. Additional awards and honors include the Illinois State Music Teachers Association (ISMTA) Competition. In the summer of 2019, she traveled to Italy and participated in the Amalfi Coast Music Festival where she played in masterclasses with Kathryn Brown, Boris Slutsky, Jerome Lowenthal, Inna Faliks, and Chi Wu.
Aside from competitions, Ashley has performed in retirement homes around the suburbs of Chicago and enjoys community service. She also plays the violin and serves as associate concertmaster of the New Trier Symphony Orchestra. She also received a merit scholarship award and was recently a part of the Illinois Music Education Association for violin.