Biography
A newly-named 2008 Gilmore Young Artist, twenty-year-old Naomi Kudo was born in Washington D.C. to Japanese-Korean parents. She began studying piano at the age of four, and her formal studies include instruction by Emilio del Rosario at the Music Institute of Chicago, and with Kum-Sing Lee of the Vancouver Music Academy. Kudo is currently continuing her undergraduate studies at the Juilliard School as a student of Yoheved Kaplinsky.
Kudo made her orchestral debut at age sixteen performing Tchaikovsky's First Concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and, later that same year, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra Hall playing Falla's Nights in the Gardens of Spain.
The recipient of the Chopin Prize and the winner of the 2007 Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition at the Juilliard School, Kudo has received international recognition in several competitions: as the only American finalist at the 2005 Fifteenth International Frederic Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw; Second Prize at the 2005 Seventh National Chopin Competition of the United States; First Prize at the 2003 Ninth Oberlin International Piano Competition; and First Prize at the 1999 Fifty-Third National Student Music Concours of Japan. Also an avid chamber musician, her piano trio won the silver medal at the 2003 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.
Kudo received the 2003 I.M.A. Award of Japan and a Level I Award at the 2005 National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts' Arts Recognition and Talent Search. Named a prestigious 2004 Davidson Fellow Laureate, she was awarded a $50,000 scholarship by the Davidson Institute of Talent Development.
In September Kudo opened the eighth season of The Gilmore's Rising Stars Recital Series and also performed in the Juilliard Bachauer Competition concert, which was broadcast live on WQXR Radio in New York. In December she was chosen to take part in the weeklong Emanuel Ax Carnegie Hall Professional Training Workshop, which culminated in public master classes and concerts in Weill Recital Hall. In spring of 2008, she will make numerous appearances in the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival.
Other highlights of her career include recital and concerto performances at the 2001 Fifty-Sixth International Chopin Festival in Duszniki-Zdroj, Poland; the 2001 "New Names of the 21st Century" International Music Festival in Russia; the 2002 Nagoya International Youth Music Festival in Japan; the Aspen Music Festival; Chopin's birth house "Zelazowa Wola"; the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series; the Stradivarius Museum in Cremona; the Salle Cortot in Paris; the Musikverein in Vienna; and the 2003 Opening Night Gala Celebration for the Music Institute of Chicago honoring conductor Sir Andrew Davis.
Kudo's appearances with orchestra include the Warsaw Philharmonic, the Reno Philharmonic, the Montgomery Symphony Orchestra, the Fort Collins Symphony Orchestra, the Northbrook Symphony Orchestra, the Everett Symphony Orchestra, the Symphony of Oak Park and River Forest, the Fukui Symphony Orchestra, and the Ars Viva Symphony Orchestra. She has been featured on WFMT Chicago radio's "Impromptu," "Introductions," and WQXR New York radio's "Young Artists Showcase" programs; and she is a four-time scholarship recipient from the Chopin Foundation of the United States.
Kudo is featured in "Defining Chopin", a film documentary about four American pianists competing in the 2005 15th International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw.