April 30, 2024

Praised for his “ravishing and simply gorgeous” performances in The Washington Post, pianist David Fung is widely recognized for interpretations that are elegant and refined, yet intensely poetic and uncommonly expressive. With a repertoire of over 60 concertos, Mr. Fung regularly appears with the world’s premier ensembles including the Cleveland Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, the Israel Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the National Orchestra of Belgium, and the San Francisco Symphony, as well as the major orchestras in Australia including the Melbourne, Queensland, and Sydney Symphony Orchestras, working with conductors such as Marin Alsop, Joana Carneiro, Gustavo Dudamel, Michael Francis, Stanislav Kochanovsky, Lan Shui, and Christian Zacharias. An incisive interpreter of Mozart and Bach, Mr. Fung has collaborated with the Israel, Los Angeles, Melbourne, Orpheus, and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestras, and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

Mr. Fung’s highly acclaimed debut with the Cleveland Orchestra at the Blossom Music Festival was “everything you could wish for” (Cleveland Classical), and he was further praised as an “agile and alert interpreter of Mozart’s crystalline note-spinning” (The Plain Dealer). In the following week, he performed Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini at the Beijing National Stadium for their Olympic Summer Festival. In 2021, Mr. Fung partnered with Yuja Wang in his Los Angeles Philharmonic debut conducted by Gustavo Dudamel following his performances with the Detroit Symphony celebrating the Orchestra Hall Centennial. In addition to the West Coast Premiere of Chen Qigang’s Piano Concerto, “Er Huang”, with the San Francisco Symphony, other recent solo engagements include performances with the Albany Symphony, Arkansas Symphony, Charleston Symphony, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, Israel Symphony, Las Vegas Philharmonic, Marin Symphony, the National Taiwan Symphony, Niagara Symphony, New Haven Symphony, NewJapan Philharmonic, Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie, San Diego Symphony, Southwest Florida Symphony, Sun Valley Symphony, Symphony Tacoma, Tampere Philharmonic, and Xiamen Philharmonic.

As a recitalist and chamber musician, Mr. Fung is a frequent guest artist at prestigious festivals and venues worldwide. Notable festival appearances include Aspen, Blossom, Caramoor, Edinburgh, Hong Kong Arts, Ottawa, Ravinia, and Tippet Rise. At his Edinburgh International Festival debut, the Edinburgh Guide described Mr. Fung as being “impossibly virtuosic, prodigiously talented… and who probably does ten more impossible things daily before breakfast.” He has captivated audiences at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Louvre, Gewandhaus, Palais des Beaux-Arts, and Zürich Tonhalle, as well as the major halls in Asia, including the Beijing Concert Hall, Guangzhou Opera House, Hong Kong Town Hall, Seoul Arts Center, Shanghai Oriental Art Center, Taiwan National Concert Hall, and Tianjin Grand Theater. Notable collaborations include performances with the Brentano, Dover, Jupiter, and Verona Quartets.

In August 2020, the Steinway and Sons Label released Mr. Fung’s Transcendent Beethoven album, following the label’s acclaimed 2019 release of Mr. Fung’s first installment of the complete Mozart sonatas. This Mozart album was called “undeniably bold” (AllMusic Guide) and praised by Boston’s WCRB as “heartbreaking”, adding that “Fung relishes the art of exploring Mozart’s characters – giving them freedom to breathe, and casting them in darkness and light to help reveal their humanity.” Mr. Fung can also be heard on more than a dozen accoladed releases by Pentatone, Orchid, Genuin, Yarlung, and Naxos.

Mr. Fung garnered international attention as a laureate of the Queen Elisabeth International Music Competition in Brussels and the Arthur Rubinstein Piano International Masters Competition in Tel Aviv. In Tel Aviv, he was further distinguished by the Chamber Music and Mozart Prizes, awarded in areas in which Mr. Fung has a passionate interest. He was the first piano graduate of the prestigious Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles where he studied with John Perry, going on to work with Peter Frankl and Claude Frank at Yale University, and Arie Vardi at the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien in Hannover. In 2002, he won the ABC Young Performer of the Year Award while studying with Margaret Hair in Sydney and has received further artistic guidance from piano luminaries including Alfred Brendel, Leon Fleisher, and András Schiff. Mr. Fung is a Steinway Artist.

Cong Wu joined the New York Philharmonic as Assistant Principal Viola, The Norma and Lloyd Chazen Chair, in September 2018. He is the winner of the Third Prize and the Chamber Music Prize in the Fourteenth Primrose International Viola Competition, and of the Special Prize in the Twelfth Tertis International Viola Competition. His performances throughout North America and Asia include solo appearances with the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra, New York Classical Players, and the Long Island Concert Orchestra.

An avid chamber musician, Wu has collaborated with renowned artists such as Christoph Eschenbach, David Finckel, Hilary Hahn, Itzhak Perlman, Peter Wiley, Pinchas Zukerman, the American String Quartet, and many New York Philharmonic musicians. His festival engagements have included the Marlboro Music Festival, the Perlman Music Program, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Chamber Music Encounters, Music@Menlo, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival, Chestnut Hill Concerts, the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival, and the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival in Germany. He also appears regularly with the Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, and New York Classical Players.

Passionate about teaching, Wu is on the viola faculty of the Manhattan School of Music and has taught at the Shanghai Orchestra Academy. He had formerly served on the faculty of SUNY Purchase College Conservatory of Music, as well as been a guest faculty member of the National Arts Centre Summer Music Institute in Canada. He has been invited to give masterclasses at the Mead Witter School of Music (University of Wisconsin-Madison), China Conservatory of Music, Hong Kong Baptist University, and the Renmin University of China.

Born in Jinan, China, Cong (pronounced “Ts’ong”) Wu moved to New York in 2010 after graduating from the Beijing Central Conservatory of Music. He holds a master’s degree from The Juilliard School and a doctoral degree with the Helen Cohn Award from Manhattan School of Music. His teachers have included Wing Ho, Heidi Castleman, Hsin-Yun Huang, Patinka Kopec, and Pinchas Zukerman.