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Associate Principal Cello, Richard Hill Chair

Susie Yang

Susie Yang joined the Kansas City Symphony as Associate Principal Cello in 2010. She made her solo debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the age of 11. The performance was broadcast on PBS in Chicago and also the classical radio station, 98.7 FM. She has also appeared as a soloist with many orchestras in the greater Chicago area. As an avid chamber musician, she won a top prize in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and has participated in the Juilliard Quartet Seminar and the Beethoven Intensive Quartet Seminar at the New England Conservatory of Music. From 2006-2008, Susie was a fellow of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach and was a rotating principal under music director, Michael Tilson Thomas. After winning the concerto competition, she performed the Dvořák Cello Concerto with the New World Symphony in 2007. In April of 2016, Susie performed Dvorak Cello Concerto again, as a subscription soloist, with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. Susie has performed as a soloist, orchestral, and chamber musician at many music festivals, including Sarasota, Schleswig-Holstein, Music Academy of the West, Spoleto Italy and USA, Taos, and Yellow Barn. Originally from the northwest suburbs of Chicago, Susie holds degrees and numerous scholarship awards from The Juilliard School and New England Conservatory of Music, and her teachers include Andre Emelianoff and Laurence Lesser. She has a small private studio of cello students that she loves to teach and enjoys performing chamber music around the community.


Susie Yang

Susie Yang joined the Kansas City Symphony as Associate Principal Cello in 2010. She made her solo debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the age of 11. The performance was broadcast on PBS in Chicago and also the classical radio station, 98.7 FM. She has also appeared as a soloist with many orchestras in the greater Chicago area. As an avid chamber musician, she won a top prize in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and has participated in the Juilliard Quartet Seminar and the Beethoven Intensive Quartet Seminar at the New England Conservatory of Music. From 2006-2008, Susie was a fellow of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach and was a rotating principal under music director, Michael Tilson Thomas. After winning the concerto competition, she performed the Dvořák Cello Concerto with the New World Symphony in 2007. In April of 2016, Susie performed Dvorak Cello Concerto again, as a subscription soloist, with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra. Susie has performed as a soloist, orchestral, and chamber musician at many music festivals, including Sarasota, Schleswig-Holstein, Music Academy of the West, Spoleto Italy and USA, Taos, and Yellow Barn. Originally from the northwest suburbs of Chicago, Susie holds degrees and numerous scholarship awards from The Juilliard School and New England Conservatory of Music, and her teachers include Andre Emelianoff and Laurence Lesser. She has a small private studio of cello students that she loves to teach and enjoys performing chamber music around the community.

My mom is a cellist who played in the Seoul Philharmonic and my sister is a violinist. My dad collects many historic classical music performances on LP and CD.

As long as I am with good friends and there is good food (and a lot of it), I can hang out almost anywhere.

The first concert I played here as the Associate Principal is very memorable to me because I was nervous and excited at the same time. It was in March 2010 and we performed George Crumb’s A Haunted Landscape, Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Robert Levin, and Copland’s Symphony No. 4. It was a great concert and a lot of fun for me!

I need to have eggs and kimchi.

Bach, Bach, and more Bach.

Honesty

It has changed here and there, but I think I would be interested in fashion journalism or a surgeon!

Schaumburg, Illinois

Working on my house that was built in 1908 and has much of the original wood and character, or hanging out with friends exploring the city!