Biography

Pianist Hannah Che has established herself as a versatile solo artist, chamber musician, educator and music writer. She is prizewinner of competitions including the WVU International Piano Competition, the Duquesne National Piano Competition, the Streator-Smith Memorial Competition, and the David Dubois International Piano Competition. Over the past six years, Hannah has given annual recitals featuring the solo works of Ligeti, Ravel, Brahms, Schumann, Liebermann, and Janáček, and concerti by Beethoven and Rachmaninoff. An avid chamber and collaborative musician, her repertoire encompasses works ranging from Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos and Barber’s Hermit Songs to Bartok’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Two Percussion and Peter Jalbert’s Trio No. 1, as well as contemporary pieces written by fellow musicians.

Hannah has worked with renowned artists including Vladimir Feltsman, Alexander Korsantia, Antonio Pompa­-Baldi, Emanuel Krasovsky, Eteri Andjaparidze, Eduardo Delgado, and Agustin Anievas, among others. Summer music festival appearances include PianoSummer at New Paltz, the Miami Summer Piano Institute, and the Todi International Music Masters Festival in Perugia, Italy, where her performances at the Palazzo del Vignola were broadcast live on the Italian media channel One Talent TV. On air, she has been heard on The Saturday Light Brigade, WISR Butler, and Pittsburgh’s classical radio music station WQED FM.

Born of Chinese and Korean heritage in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Hannah began her piano studies at the age of five. She received her Masters of Music and Bachelor of Music degree with Distinction from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, where she studied with Robert Roux. As a writer, Hannah is recipient of the 2017 George Williams Prize in Poetry, and her poems have been published in R2: The Rice Review. She was the primary classical music critic at Houstonia Magazine for the 2018-19 season, producing opera and concert reviews with the occasional reportage.