Zachary Allen, 18, is a recent graduate of Niles West High School. He is a Merit Scholar at the Music Institute of Chicago where he has studied with Erica Anderson for five years. Zachary is also a fellow of the Chicago Musical Pathways Initiative. He was a member of Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras for four seasons, serving as principal oboist of their flagship Symphony Orchestra and the selective chamber orchestra, CORE. This past spring, Zachary was selected by Maestro Tinkham as the Music Director’s Student Conducting Fellow and made his conducting debut at Symphony Center.
He has received awards in several competitions, including the DePaul Concerto Festival and the Walgreens National Concerto Competition. As a winner of the American Fine Arts Festival, Zachary made his Carnegie Hall debut in 2021. Most recently, he made his solo orchestral debut as a finalist in the 2023 International Young Artist Concerto Competition.
Zachary previously appeared on Introductions as a member of the CYSO Jubilee Woodwind Quintet in May 2022, and was interviewed as part of the episode marking Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras’ first concert back in Symphony Center in January 2022. In 2022, he was named a Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award recipient and was featured on Show 416 of NPR’s From the Top.
This fall, Zachary will be attending Oberlin College & Conservatory to study oboe performance with Robert Walters.