Kaian Ann Wu
Piano
Kaian Ann Wu, born in Taiwan, has explored solo and chamber music from baroque to contemporary and has performed extensively throughout the United States in Illinois, Michigan, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, Texas, and major cities in Canada, Germany and Taiwan. The News-Gazette Review said, “Wu is clearly an artist of fine technical skills coupled with great powers of concentration and the marked ability to convey the structural complexities of musical works…,” at her solo debut recital at Krannert Center for the Performing Arts in April 2005. She was invited to perform at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall in May 2004 upon her winning first prize at the Bradshaw & Buono International Piano Competition. Wu’s numerous awards include the Krannert Center Debut Artist Competition, University Graduate Scholarships from the University of Cincinnati, Graduate Assistantships in both studio teaching and studio accompanying from the University of Illinois. Her doctoral studies of contemporary music brought her to perform selected winning compositions for solo piano selected by the American Composers Invitational of the 2001 and 2005 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.
Wu received the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in piano performance and literature from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Master of Music degree in piano performance from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati; and Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University. Her principal teachers include Benjamin Pasternack, Richard Fields, Frank Weinstock and Ian Hobson. Wu extended her summer studies at the University of Western Ontario in Canada and Hochschule fur Musik and Theater “Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy” in Leipzig, Germany.
As an active adjudicator and clinician, Wu is a member of the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) and has judged several recitals and competitions held by MTNA in the United States. In the summer of 2010, she was invited to serve as chairperson of piano for the Belvoir Terrace Fine and Performing Arts Camp in Lenox, Massachusetts. Wu serves on the faculty of the Olney Conservatory of Music and the Peabody Preparatory of the Johns Hopkins University.
