Ray Chen

Winner of the Queen Elisabeth Competition (2009) and the Yehudi Menuhin Competition (2008) and is among the most compelling young violinists today. “Ray has proven himself to be a very pure musician with great qualities such as a beautiful youthful tone, vitality and lightness. He has all the skills of a truly musical interpreter,” said his friend and mentor Maxim Vengerov. 

Mr. Chen’s premiere album Virtuoso, released worldwide on Sony Classical in January 2011, won prestigious Echo Klassik Award 2011. The recording has received glowing reviews from a range of major publications including The Times and Chicago Tribune, which named it the “CD of the week”. Following the success of this album, Ray Chen was profiled by The Strad and Gramophone magazines as “the one to watch”. His 2011 recital tour featuring Virtuoso repertoire included Tokyo, Hamburg, Berlin, Munich, Zurich, and Dresden. 

“The musicianship of Ray Chen is just as exciting as that of Gustavo Dudamel. He seems to have it all: instantly recognizable tone, charismatic personality and musical authority unusual for his age. He is at the beginning of a major career and it is a privilege to build it with him,” says Bogdan Roscic, President of Sony Classical. Ray Chen is currently working on his next CD with Daniel Harding and the Swedish Radio Orchestra. For this first orchestral recording, slated for worldwide release in January 2012, he chose the Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn concertos, which have particular personal significance as the pieces he played in the final rounds of the two competitions. 

Ray Chen continues to win the admiration of fans and fellow musicians worldwide. This year’s Verbier and Dresden Festival debuts resulted in immediate re-engagements in 2012. He received standing ovations at Ravinia and Schleswig-Holstein, where he was featured by the Munich Philharmonic. One of the highlights of the last season was a sold-out performance with the Seoul Philharmonic and Maestro Myung-Whun Chung at the Asian Games Festival in Guangzhou. He is looking forward to his upcoming engagements with the Filarmonica della Scala, National Orchestra of Spain, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and Israel Philharmonic, among others. 

Born in Taiwan and raised in Australia, Ray Chen was accepted to the Curtis Institute of Music at the age of 15, where he studied with Aaron Rosand. Mr. Chen plays the 1721 “Macmillan” Stradivarius provided as part of the award for winning the 2008-09 Young Concert Artists International Auditions in New York.