William Yang

Age: 24

Hometown: New York, New York

School/Teacher: Juilliard School / Robert McDonald

Twenty-four-year-old William Yang won first prize at the 2025 National Chopin Piano Competition in Miami, Florida. In addition to the $100,000 prize, he will receive a recording project with the Steinway label and will embark on a concert tour, which includes a performance at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in June 2025. At the same competition, William also won awards for the best performance of a mazurka and a sonata.

William has gained recognition in several prestigious competitions, including Second Prize at the 2014 Midwest International Piano Competition, Sixth Prize at the 2018 Thomas and Evon Cooper International Piano Competition, and he was a semifinalist who won the special Bach Prize at the 2015 Cleveland International Piano Competition.

As a soloist, Mr. Yang has performed with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, the Southeast Iowa Symphony Orchestra, and the Minnesota Orchestra. He studied at the Curtis Institute of Music and is currently a Kovner Fellow at The Juilliard School, where he is under the guidance of Robert McDonald. His previous teachers include Alexander Korsantia and Paul Wirth. He has also received instruction from notable pianists such as Hung-Kuan Chen, Yoheved Kaplinsky, Antonio Pompa-Baldi, Gary Graffman, Peter Takacs, Boris Berman, and Andre Watts.

William began his piano studies at the age of four and gave his first performances when he was seven. Outside of music, he enjoys playing table tennis.