ChoEun Lee

ChoEun Lee, a native of South Korea, is an active pianist, vocal coach, and chamber musician.She has given numerous performances in Korea, the United States, Austria, Australia, Italy,New Zealand, and Taiwan; in major venues, including Carnegie Hall in New York City, OzawaHall in Tanglewood Music Center, and Harris Concert Hall in Aspen Music Festival. She has worked extensively in recitals and masterclasses with renowned musicians, includingStephanie Blythe, Jake Heggie, Martin Katz, Anne Sofie von Otter, Christine Schäfer, Dawn Upshaw, and Linda Watson. She was a pianist in Opera gala concerts at the Opera Theatre andMusic Festival in Lucca, Italy, where she worked with Donna Brunsma, Gianfranco Cosmi, and Rolando Russo. She was twice invited to Tanglewood Music Festival and has been named a recipient of the Grace B. Jackson Prize. One of her performances in Seiji Ozawa Hall was broadcasted on WAMC. She was also invited to the Emerging Artist Fellowship Program in FallIsland Vocal Arts Seminar in Potsdam (NY), directed by Stephanie Blythe and Alan Smith.Since 2016, she has been invited as a repetiteur to the American Institute of Musical Studies(AIMS) in Graz (Austria).

 

ChoEun Lee, as a harpsichordist, has performed many Baroque music concerts, and she is also passionate about discovering and performing contemporary classical music and vocal chamber music. She has appeared many times at the Grandin Vocal Chamber Music Festival inCincinnati. She has premiered various works and has worked with many living composers, including John Harbison, Michael Gandolfi, Douglas Hedwig, Jake Heggie, Thomas Pasatieri, John Plant, and Chinary Ung. She world-premiered co-commissioned vocal chamber music, The Ocean of Eternity, for soprano, saxophone, and piano by Lori  Laitman, in theNational Opera Center in New York City, and she recently participated in Laitman's new CD release,The Ocean of Eternity. (Label: ACIS, spring 2022).

 

ChoEun has been actively involved in choral ensembles. She has appeared at National Collegiate Choral Organization conference in Fort Collins, CO, in 2011, with Chamber Singers at USC, directed by Dr. Jo-Michael Scheibe, where she was acclaimed by a composer, Paul Carey: ‘ChoEun Lee’s subtle phrasing was the epitome of expressive choral accompanying. Every note and phrase she touched were golden, EVERY note mattered, and that is something you do not often hear…’ ChoEun joined a choir tour with USC Chamber Singers to New Zealand and Australia, performing concerts in Wellington, Christchurch, Auckland, Sydney, and Brisbane. Recently she joined the Lee University Chorale tour to Advent Sing in Vienna, Austria and has performed at Wien Rathaus.

 

As an active clinician, ChoEun Lee has given numerous masterclasses and presentations, including at Chattanooga Music Teachers Association (CMTA), Covenant College, Georgia College, Yeungnam University (Korea), Seoul Cyber University (Korea), Taitung University (Taiwan), and the National Taipei Normal University (Taiwan). She was invited to the Annual UTC Piano Arts Festival as a guest artist and competition adjudicator; and she judged at the Georgia Music Teachers Association (GMTA) competition and the TN Festival Music Competition. She was invited as a guest panel to CollabFest at the University of Southern California and the University of North Texas.

 

ChoEun Lee holds a B.M. from Kyungwon University, an M.M. from the University of Cincinnati, and a D.M.A from the University of Southern California. She is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda, the national music honor society, and a recipient of the Gwendolyn Koldofsky Keyboard Collaborative Arts scholarship four times. She currently serves on the leadership team of the International Keyboard Collaborative Arts Society (IKCAS), the CollabFest (an international conference for collaborative pianists) as an assistant artistic director, the Executive Board at the Tennessee Music Teachers Association (TMTA) as a recording secretary, and the Program Committee at the Chattanooga Music Teachers Association (CMTA). ChoEun Lee is a director of LeeU Collab Music and teaches at Lee University as an assistant professor of collaborative piano and vocal coaching.