Seong-Jin Cho

Seong-Jin Cho has established himself as one of the leading pianists of his generation and among the most distinctive artists on the current music scene, celebrated worldwide for his poetic, virtuosic, and colorful playing and his impressive natural sense of balance.

Cho came to international attention in 2015, when he won first prize at the Chopin International Competition in Warsaw, and his career has ascended rapidly since. He signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon in 2016, and in 2023 he received the Samsung Ho-Am Prize in the Arts in recognition of his contributions to classical music.

He works with the world's most prestigious orchestras and conductors, and in the 2024-25 season he served as artist in residence with the Berlin Philharmonic. In the 2025-26 season, Cho is the focus of the London Symphony Orchestra's Artist Portrait series, collaborating with the orchestra across multiple projects, including the world premiere of a new piano concerto written for him by Donghoon Shin, European touring, chamber music, and a recital at LSO St. Luke's.

Also during the 2024-25 season, Cho marked the 150th anniversary of Maurice Ravel's birth by performing the composer's complete solo piano music internationally, and his latest Deutsche Grammophon recording presents Ravel's complete solo piano works and concertos, his first immersion in a single composer's complete works. The solo piano works received an Opus Klassik Award in the 2025 instrumentalist of the year category. This season he returns to Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Concertgebouw, and the Vienna Musikverein.

In the 2025-26 season, he returns to the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under Manfred Honeck, and to Carnegie Hall with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel. International tours include the Czech Philharmonic with Semyon Bychkov in Taiwan and Japan, the Munich Philharmonic with Lahav Shani in Korea, Japan, and Taiwan, and the Gewandhaus Orchestra with Andris Nelsons across Europe.

Born in Seoul in 1994, Cho began the piano at age 6 and gave his first public recital at 11. In 2009 he became the youngest-ever winner of Japan's Hamamatsu International Piano Competition, and in 2011 he won third prize at the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow at age 17. He studied with Michel Béroff at the Paris Conservatoire and is now based in Berlin.