Since winning the 2008 International Yehudi Menuhin Violin Competition, the Taiwanese-Australian violinist has become one of the most exciting young performers – and a hit on social media.
Born on 6 March 1989 in Taipei, Taiwan, Ray Chen began learning violin at the age of four.
He was invited to play solo with the Queensland Philharmonic Orchestra at the age of eight and performed at the opening celebration concert of the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
By the age of nine, he had completed all 10 levels of the Suzuki Music Education method in Queensland.
Professor Goetz Richter, chair of the String Unit at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music described Chen as "one of the most talented and accomplished young violinists to have emerged from Australia."
In April 2008 he won the senior division first prize of the Yehudi Menuhin International Competition for Young Violinists in Cardiff, Wales.
Chen came to the attention of Maxim Vengerov, who served on the Menuhin competition jury. Subsequently, Chen was engaged for performances including debuts with the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra in St. Petersburg and at the International Rostropovich Festival with the State Symphony Orchestra of Baku, Azerbaijan, under the baton of Vengerov.
He was signed by Sony Classical in 2010. He has recorded the Cesar Franck Violin Sonata, the violin concertos of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Felix Mendelssohn.
He was invited to perform at the annual Nobel Prize Concert in 2012, playing Max Bruch's Violin Concerto in G minor with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra.
