*Cheng-Zong Yin*, one of the world’s leading pianists, was born on China’s “Piano Island”, Gulangyu, in Xiamen, Fujian Province. He gave his first recital when he was nine years old. Three years later, he entered the Shanghai Conservatory, and was later transferred to the Central Conservatory in Beijing, where he earned his bachelor’s degree. He then went to Russia and graduated from the Leningrad Conservatory in 1963. Mr. Yin was the Gold Medallist of the World Youth Peace and Friendship Festival held in Vienna in 1959, and the second prize winner of the 1962 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, when he was only twenty years old. He was one of the four Chinese musicians listed in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians published in 1980.

Mr. Yin made his Carnegie Hall debut in New York City in 1983, and has been back there four times as a soloist. The New York Times called him “China’s best pianist.” Bernard Holland praised “… his absolutely beautiful command of piano colors…”

Mr. Yin traveled all over the world and has performed with Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra, Claudio Abbado and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra,

Kiril Kondrashin and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Malcolm Sargent and the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, in addition to his performance in Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Toronto, and New York’s Lincoln Center. His solos were featured in China’s Central television and the CBS Sunday Morning Show. He was a professor and the artist-in-residence at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Mr. Yin is not only a virtuoso interpreter of Western masters, he has also composed some of the best-known piano pieces on his own. His piano expression of traditional Beijing opera and of other classic Chinese music, together with his contribution to the “Yellow River Concerto” made him a household name in China. His recording of the latter won him a Gold Record Award.

Mr. Yin has released more than 20 records, including the All Chopin CD and Debussy’s 24 Preludes, soon to be followed by his Rachmaninov Concertos No.2 and No.3 in cooperation with the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra.