Lio Kuok-Wai

In June 2005, Lio Kuok-Wai was awarded first prize in “The Gina Bachauer International Young Artists Competition” in Salt Lake City. In the same year he received the gold prize and Yoda prize at the open class of “The Sixth Chopin International Piano Competition of Asia” in Tokyo. Other achievements include: third prize at “The Fifth Tchaikovsky International Competition for Young Musicians" in Japan (2004), first prize and audience prize at “The First International Institute for Young Musicians International Piano Competition" in Lawrence, KS (2004), second prize at “The Third Seiler International Piano Competition for Young Pianists" in Germany (2003), first prizes at “The First Toyama Asian Youth Music Competition” in Hong Kong (2002) and “The 65th Steinway & Sons International Youth Piano Competition” in Beijing (2002).

At the age of nine, Lio made his concerto debut with the Macau Orchestra. One year later, he was invited to perform with the Macau Orchestra at the opening ceremony of the 11th Macau Arts Festival (2000). He has performed in various music festivals including the 17th Macau International Music Festival (2003), The Year of France and China Festival (2004), ”The Macau Week in Las Vegas” (2005), the 34th Hong Kong Arts Festival (2005), the 2006 Harbin Summer Music Festival in China and the 2006 Golandsky Institute International Piano Festival at Princeton University.

He has appeared as soloist with the Hong Kong Philharmonic, Pan Asia Symphony Orchestra, Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, Macau Orchestra, Russian Symphony Orchestra and the China Philharmonic Orchestra. His performance has been broadcasted by the Radio Television of Hong Kong and the Kansas Public Radio in the USA. Lio has also performed in master classes given by Emanuel Ax, Aldo Ciccolini, Claude Frank, Murray Perahia, Paul Badura-Skoda and Krystian Zimerman.

Lio was born in Macau in 1989 and began his piano studies at the age of five. From 1997-2006, he was awarded scholarships from the Oriental Foundation and the Cultural Affairs Bureau of Macau to study at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts under Wang Nan and Gabriel Kwok. In 2006, he was awarded a full-tuition scholarship to The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, PA to study with renowned pianist, Gary Graffman.