Biographical Info

Described by International Piano Magazine as: “…an armour-clad player of complete technique, a thinking
musician, a natural Romantic.”, BOBBY CHEN was a pupil of Ruth Nye and Hamish Milne at the Yehudi
Menuhin School and the Royal Academy of Music, and burst on the scene in 1996 playing Beethoven’s
Triple Concerto in a British tour with Lord Yehudi Menuhin and the Warsaw Sinfonia, and a recital at the
Royal Festival Hall as part of the South Bank Prokofiev Festival.
Since then, he has performed as concerto soloist with several orchestras including the Academy of St
Martin-in-the-Fields, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra and the London
Sinfonietta, under the baton of conductors Matthias Bamert, Maximiano Valdés, Michał Nesterowicz, Sir
Neville Marriner, Pierre-André Valade, Lan Shui, Jonathan Bloxham and Giancarlo Guerrero. He has
broadcast live for UK’s Classic Fm, Ireland’s Raidió Teilifís Éireann (Radio Television Ireland), Hong Kong’s
Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) and USA’s Pianoforte Chicago.
He was one of the pianists selected for the South-East Asian début of the Complete Beethoven Sonatas
Cycle in Singapore, and has performed solo recitals and piano concertos at Hong Kong’s City Hall, Italy’s
Fazioli Concert Hall, Dublin’s National Concert Hall, Kuala Lumpur’s Dewan Filharmonik Petronas,
Singapore’s Victoria Concert Hall, Turku’s Sibelius Museum, and at UK’s Bridgewater Hall, Royal Concert
Hall, Cadogan Hall, Purcell Room, Reid Concert Hall, Royal Overseas League and Menuhin Hall, including
four solo recitals at the Wigmore Hall.
He has given world premiere performances of music by Tazul Izan Tajuddin, Stephen Goss, Douglas Finch,
Cheryl Frances-Hoad and Benjamin Dwyer. He celebrated Malaysia’s 50th Anniversary as a nation by giving
the world premiere performance of a new piano concerto at London’s Cadogan Hall. He is founder of the
biennial Overseas Masters Winter Piano Academy (OMWPA), which has taken place on the premises of the
Yehudi Menuhin School since 2010.
A keen fundraiser, he has performed as soloist at Corpus Christi College in Oxford, at Pembroke College in
Cambridge and at the Royal College of Music as part of a fundraising campaign to raise more than three
million pounds for the construction of a new music centre at Monkton Combe School. He has performed a
solo recital for the British Jesuit Alumni/ae Charitable Trust at Ognisko Polskie in support of The Langlands
School and College in Pakistan, a solo recital in support of Rainforest Concern at the Travellers Club, a short
solo recital of women composers for The Federations of International Women’s Association in London at
Ironmongers’ Hall, a piano duet recital with Alberto Portugheis featuring Jacob Costard in the presence of
HM Lord-Lieutenant of Surrey for OASIS (Oasis Childcare Centre Ltd) and a performance with Leslie
Howard and Simon Callow CBE of Prokofiev’s ‘Peter and the Wolf’ at the Reform Club in support of The
David Nott Foundation. He has performed three solo recitals at Farm Street Church in Mayfair with the first
solo recital for Caritas Ukraine, the second solo recital for CAFOD (The Catholic Agency for Overseas
Development) in aid of the East Africa Food Crisis, and the third solo recital in aid of Jesuit Missions’ Turkey
and Syria earthquake appeal and Jesuit Refugee Services in Syria in the presence of Guest of honour from
the Turkish embassy. He has also performed two private London recitals for winning bidders of auctions
organised separately by the Keyboard Charitable Trust and an unnamed individual. http://www.bobbychen.org