William Shi

Australian pianist William Shi has won first prizes at numerous competitions including the Petrof, Vivace, Yamaha and Queensland piano competitions. He is a recipient of the Theme & Variations Foundation Award and an American Australian Association Arts Fund grant, and he has been supported by the Australian Music Foundation (AMF) since 2021. In 2023, he became the inaugural winner of the AMF Richard Bonynge Award, the first award created by the AMF for a collaborative pianist. His U.S. performances have been broadcast on “Performance Today,” WCRB and WXXI Classical, with reviews of his collaborations citing “crisp and clean extended solos” (The Boston Music Intelligencer), “with passion” (Classical Source) and “precise coordination” (The Berkshire Edge).

Shi’s recent recital partners include concertmasters and principal players of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Erie Philharmonic, Grand Rapids Symphony, Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Jacksonville Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Mecklenburgisches Staatstheater, North Carolina Symphony and Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. These partnerships have led to international appearances at the Australian Festival of Chamber Music, the Australian Piano Duo Festival, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, Ozawa Hall, Granada Theater, Brahmshaus in Baden-Baden, Szabelski’s Hall in Katowice and Verbrugghen Hall in Sydney among others.

A versatile and sought-after collaborator, Shi has performed in master classes with distinguished artists including Gil Shaham, Glenn Dicterow, Maxim Vengerov, Norman Fischer, Steven Isserlis, Walter Auer, Martin Katz, Dawn Upshaw and Renée Fleming. He has worked with the Australian Strings Association Competition, Szymanowski International Violin Competition, National Flute Association Young Artists Competition, Australasian Double Reed Society National Competition, Finger Lakes Opera and the Underground Opera Company.

In 2022, Shi was the only pianist nationwide to be offered full fellowships to Music Academy of the West’s Collaborative Piano Program and both of Aspen Music Festival’s vocal and instrumental piano programs. In 2023, he was the only Tanglewood fellow accepted into both instrumental and vocal piano disciplines and was invited back in 2024 to lead the inaugural combined Tanglewood piano cohort.

Shi completed undergraduate studies at the University of Queensland with Max Olding where he was awarded the University Medal. Upon graduating with a master’s degree at Mannes School of Music with Arkady Aronov, he received the Newton Swift Piano Award—presented “to an outstanding soloist who is also an amiable colleague in accompanying and chamber music.” Shi is a recent graduate of the Eastman School of Music where he was the teaching assistant for Natalya Antonova and Ran Dank with whom he undertook a DMA in piano performance and literature; as well as teaching assistant to Andrew Harley with whom he earned a concurrent master’s in piano accompanying and chamber music. Shi is a four-time recipient of Eastman’s Excellence in Accompanying Award in addition to the Jean Barr Award in Accompanying. He has held positions at Nazareth University and currently serves as lecturer of collaborative piano at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Collaborative piano