Honggi Kim

In Honggi Kim’s childhood home in Wonju, his sister played an electric keyboard; his parents then encouraged him to start learning the instrument after he played the same pieces she did, on his own, by ear. During his middle school years at art school in Seoul, he also studied composition, which he credits with deepening his understanding of music and its logic, so that he could develop his own interpretations. He went on to graduate from the Seoul Arts High School and Korea National University of Arts; he has lived and studied in Germany since 2014, at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München and the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Frankfurt am Main, with Arnulf von Arnim and Antti Siirala. Honggi has been awarded prizes at numerous international piano competitions, including Geneva, China International, Isang Yun (Korea), Jaén (Spain), and Géza Anda (Switzerland). He was a semifinalist in the 2017 Cliburn Competition and, in 2019, won the Hong Kong International Piano Competition. He has given recitals in Switzerland, Italy, Germany, China, Singapore, Japan, and Korea; and performed with orchestras including Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Macau Orchestra, Changwon Symphony Orchestra, Wonju Symphony Orchestra, Münchner Kammerorchester, Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, and Korean Symphony Orchestra.