Alex Yang, piano recital
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Alex Yang is a grade ten student at the Halifax Grammar School and has been a student of Professor Lynn Stodola since 2015. He will be continuing his studies this year at the Royal Conservatory’s Phil and Eli Taylor Academy (Toronto) in the Senior Piano Program with Michael Berkovsky. Other studies include Orford Musique Summer Camp with André Laplante, John Perry and David Jalbert, Lamp with Jane Coop and Angela Hewitt: he also has played for Charles Richard-Hamelin. This past summer he was the youngest of 10 international pianists selected to participate in a week-long masterclass with Angela Hewitt in the Trasimeno Music Festival Masterclasses. In the final concert, Alex was praised by music critic Christopher Axworthy for his “remarkable clarity and sense of line on a dynamic rhythmic base of great nobility” as well as his “remarkable sensitivity.”
Alex has been nominated on the CBC’s “top 30 Canadian classical musicians under 30” list of 2023. Representing Nova Scotia in the Canadian Federation of Music Teachers’ Association (CFMTA) competition in July 2023, Alex received the Chopin Society Prize for an outstanding performance of a work by Chopin, the Most Promising Artist Award, and the overall third place prize.
Representing Nova Scotia in 2022, Alex was the first place winner in the piano category of the Federation of Canadian Music Festivals (FCMF). He then proceeded to become the grand prize winner after an internationally acclaimed panel of adjudicators unanimously declared him as the winner of all first place winners between all instrumental disciplines. Because of this, Alex has won a professional performance opportunity with the Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance (LAMP) on December 3rd, 2023.
Locally, Alex has been a regular participant of the Nova Scotia Kiwanis Music Festival since he was 7 years old. He has won numerous awards, including the Doctor Piano and Yamaha Rose Bowl, the President’s Cup, and a bursary from the Lunenberg Academy of Music Performance. He has been a regular recipient of scholarships from the Nova Scotia Talent Trust since he was 8 years old, and he has received the Raymond Simpson award in 2022.
Alex was invited to play a solo recital at Government House on their Music on Tuesday series as one of the youngest Nova Scotia Talent Trust scholarship recipients. He made his solo recital debut on Cecilia’s 2020/21 concert series and was presented in recital as part of Musique Royale’s 36th Summer Festival in Tatamagouche. He has performed with the Chebucto Symphony Orchestra, Nova Sinfonia, Toronto Sinfonietta, and the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra. He will be playing with Symphony Nova Scotia on a Young Peoples’ Concert program in November.