biography

When Chaeyoung Park was growing up in South Korea, classical music was the soundtrack for long car rides with her parents. When her grandmother gifted the family a piano to “enhance the living room décor,” it quickly became a source of fascination for Chaeyoung.

She started piano lessons at age six and was soon expected by her teachers to practice several hours a day. Tantrums and tears ensued. Her parents assured her she could stop at any time and that they would support her no matter what. Chaeyoung kept practicing.

When her childhood teacher said she had the potential to become a concert pianist, her father moved the family to Kansas so she could pursue a musical education in the United States. She was ten, didn’t speak English, and had no idea how to navigate a culture on the opposite side of the world. Music became her language and her anchor. It also turned out she was rather good at it — her teenage years brought Silver Medal at the Gina Bachauer International Young Artists Competition and Bronze Medal at the Cleveland International Young Artists Competition.

At eighteen, she moved to New York City to study at The Juilliard School, where she earned three degrees under the guidance of Robert McDonald— and the Arthur Rubinstein Prize, awarded to one outstanding graduating pianist each year. The training was rigorous, the competition fierce, and the city occasionally overwhelming — but it also gave her some of the most defining musical experiences of her life. During a chamber music rehearsal, she found herself unexpectedly in tears — not from frustration, but from joy. It was the first time she felt completely understood through music. That moment shifted how she thought about performance: not as a quest for perfection, but rather, one for connection.

Since then, Chaeyoung has gone on to win First Prizes at the 2022 Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the 2019 Hilton Head International Piano Competition, and was named a Finalist in the 2023 Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition— earning recognition from Gramophone as “a world-class musician on every level.” These recognitions opened doors to stages she once only imagined: the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, the Gilmore Rising Stars series, and festivals from Bravo! Vail to the Schiermonnikoog Festival in the Netherlands and ArtCenter LIM in Seoul. Along the way she has performed concertos with the Israel Philharmonic, Kansas City Symphony, Charlotte Symphony, and Knoxville Symphony, and collaborated with artists including Zlatomir Fung and Anthony Marwood at Tippet Rise, Boston Celebrity Series, Shriver Hall and Peasmarsh Music Festival.

Chaeyoung plays because she still chases that feeling of connection — of being fully “in it” with others — that she discovered in that rehearsal room years ago. It draws her equally to intimate venues and grand concert halls, to solo recitals and the inspiring chemistry of chamber music. She dreams of one day starting a festival built around music, community, and very good food.