Rachel Cheung

Early life and education

Cheung comes from a musical family. Her father, a piano teacher, gave her first piano lessons at age four. At age ten, she was admitted to The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (HKAPA) as a junior student studying under Professor Eleanor Wong, Artist-in-Residence and Senior Lecturer in Keyboard. She also attended secondary school at the Maryknoll Convent School. For college, she continued studies at HKAPA with Professor Wong and obtained her Bachelor of Music degree in Piano Performance with First Class Honours in June 2011 on a full scholarship from the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation.

In September 2011, Cheung began studies overseas with Professor Peter Frankl at the Yale School of Music in the USA on full scholarships from Yale and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Music and Dance Fund Scholarship. She was awarded the Elizabeth Parisot Prize with Larry Weng for outstanding pianists at the Yale School of Music during school year 2011–2012. On May 20, 2013 Cheung was conferred the Master of Music degree in piano at Yale School of Music's 120th Commencement.

Junior competitions

In 2001 Cheung won First Prize in the Hong Kong regional competition of the Steinway and Sons International Youth Piano Competition. At her first competition in Europe, she claimed First Prize at the 2002 Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod for Western Instrumental Group under 15 in Wales. In May 2003, Cheung won First Prize in the Junior Group (under age 15) at the “5th Biennial International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz” in the Ukraine. Besides winning the Gold Medal, she was awarded three special prizes from the jury: Most Outstanding Concerto Performance, Best Performance of Romantic Period Pieces, and Youngest Participant of the Competition. Also in 2003, Cheung was awarded First Prize in the Piano Solo division and First Prize in the Piano Concerto under Age 18 division at the 55th Hong Kong School Music Festival. In June 2004, she won First Prize and a Peer Jury Prize for the most popular finalist at the 2004 Gina Bachauer International Junior Piano Competition in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Senior competitions

In 2008, Cheung won second prize at the Alessandro Casagrande International Piano Competition in Terni, Italy. In September 2009 she won fifth prize at the Leeds International Pianoforte Competition, the best result a Hong Kong pianist has achieved in this prestigious competition. She was also a semi-finalist at the XVI International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in October 2010. In November 2012, Cheung was awarded the George Leibenson Special Prize at the 67th Geneva International Music Competition in Piano.

2005

On April 14, 2005, 13-year-old Cheung performed an extraordinary program to thunderous applause, cheers, and whistles at the 2005 Miami International Piano Festival at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She performed Bach's Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue in D minor, Haydn's Piano Sonata in E-flat major, Liszt's "Étude in F minor, La leggierezza," "Au bord d'une source (S.156, No. 2b)," and "Étude No. 5 in E major, La chasse,' Chopin's "Variations brilliantes in B-flat major," Faure's "Nocturne No. 1 in E-flat minor," "Barcarolle No. 4 in A-flat major," and "Impromptu No. 2 in F minor," and Prokofiev's "Suggestion diabolique, Op. 4, No. 4" and "Piano Sonata No. 3 in A minor, Op. 28." When it was over, the audience presented Cheung with seven bouquets and a stuffed lamb.

2006

On December 14, 2006 Cheung played a solo recital at Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall at The Joy of Music Festival organized by the Chopin Society of Hong Kong. Her programme included Mozart's Fantasy No. 2 in C minor, K. 396/385f and Piano Sonata No. 18 in D major, K. 576; Liszt's Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude and Two Concert Studies; Schubert's Three Piano Pieces, D. 946; Chopin's Four Mazurkas, Op. 24 and Ballade in F minor, Op. 52, No. 4 and Poulenc's Trois pièces, FP 48.

2007

On July 15, 2007, 15-year-old Cheung opened the 2007 Golandsky Institute International Piano Festival by performing works by Chopin, Copland, Mozart, and Schumann at Taplin Auditorium in Fine Hall at Princeton University, New Jersey.

2012

On February 25, 2012 Cheung performed Johannes Brahms’s Six Pieces, Op. 118 as part of The Kennedy Center's Conservatory Project featuring Yale School of Music students on The Millennium Stage at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. On December 3, 2012 she performed W.A. Mozart: Sonata No. 15 in F major, K. 533/494 in a piano master class with Robert D. Levin at Parker Recital Hall in Leigh Hall, Yale University.

2013

On September 26, 2013 Cheung performed a duo recital "A Musical Dialogue" with bassoonist Chan Ting Yuen in the Citibank Plaza lobby, Central, Hong Kong.

2014

On January 24, 2014 Cheung played a piano duet recital with Dr. Helen Cha at the Y.C. Cheng Lecture Theatre of the Hong Kong Baptist University in Kowloon.

2015

On October 4, 2015 Cheung made her debut at the Stars of Steinway Recital Series at Dunkley Music in Meridian, Idaho. Her season-opening concert was sponsored by Dunkley Music and Pianoconcert Idaho. She played Oiseaux tristes, Une barque sur l'ocean, and Alborada del gracioso from Ravel's Miroirs, Brahms' Four Piano Pieces, Op. 119, and Prokofiev's Piano Sonata No. 6 in A major, Op. 82. Receiving multiple standing ovations and applause, she played two encores: Chopin's Prelude Op. 28, No. 6 and Liszt's La Campanella.