“A genuine musician” - Isaac Stern, Miyazaki, Japan, May 2001 ”
An outstanding international musician of our time, Vietnamese pianist Dang Thai Son was propelled to the fore-front of the musical world in October 1980, when he was awarded the First Prize and Gold Medal at the Xth International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. It was also the first time that a top international competition was won by an Asian pianist.
He has played with numerous world-class orchestras such as the Leningrad Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Dresden Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Berlin, Baden-Baden Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic, Warsaw National Philharmonic, Prague Symphony NHK Symphony, Helsinki Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, Hungarian State Symphony, Moscow Philharmonic, Russian National Symphony, as well as Virtuosi of Moscow, Sinfonia Varsovia, Vienna Chamber, Zurich Chamber, Royal Swedish Chamber Orchestras, and the Ensemble orchestral de Paris. Also, he has appeared under the direction of Sir Neville Marriner, Pinchas Zukerman, Mariss Jansons, Ivan Fisher, Vladimir Spivakov, Dimitri Kitaenko, James Loughram, Jiri Belohlavek, Hiroyuki Iwaki, Ken-Ichiro Kobayashi, Pavel Kogan, Jerzy Maksymiuk, Sakari Oramo, and John Nelson.
Dang Thai Son is frequently invited to give masterclasses around the world - such as the special class in Berlin in October, 1999, where he taught alongside Murray Perahia and Vladimir Ashkenazy, who extended the invitation. Since 1987, he has been a visiting professor at the Kunitachi Music College (Tokyo), and currently, he teaches at the Université de Montréal (Canada). He has sat on the juries of such prestigious competitions as the Cleveland (USA), Clara Haskil (Switzerland), Hamamatsu (Japan), Rachmaninoff (Russia), Piano Masters of Monte Carlo, Sviatoslav Richter (Moscow), Chopin (Warsaw), C. Bechstein (Germany), and Villa-Lobos (Brazil). In 2007-2008, he will serve on the juries of the Vladimir Viardo (Dallas), 4th China, Artur Rubinstein (Tel-Aviv), and Jeunesses Musicales (Montreal) International Piano Competitions.
Dang Thai Son has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, Melodya, Polskie Nagrania, CBS Sony, Victor JVC, and Analekta.
Also, he is the subject of the biography, “A pianist loved by Chopin - The Dang Thai Son Story”, published by Yamaha Music Media Corporation in 2003.
