See Siang Wong

Pianist See Siang Wong has had a versatile career, ranging from performances and recordings of core Classical-Romantic repertoire to contemporary music to cinematic selections. He has become internationally successful as a soloist, chamber musician, and accompanist. Of Singaporean- and Malaysian-Chinese background, Wong was born in Arnhem, Netherlands, on May 7, 1979. He studied in both the Netherlands and Switzerland, taking up residence and working as a teacher (at the University of Zurich) in the latter country; his Swiss Piano Project is both a series of recordings on the MGB Grammont label and a project to commission new works. He is the dedicatee of more than 30 piano works. Wong made his debut at age 12 with the Dutch Radio Orchestra. He has performed in more than 30 countries and has appeared at top concert halls in Amsterdam (the Concertgebouw), London (St. Martin in the Fields), and Bogotá (Luis Ángel Arango), among many others. Wong was signed to the Decca label in 2004 and recorded six albums for the label, featuring works by Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Chopin, Debussy, and Schumann (in a blind test, Swiss music critics chose his reading of the Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 54, over those by Martha Argerich, Evgeny Kissin, Dinu Lipatti, and Andreas Staier). He has also recorded for the Novalis label. He has collaborated with conductors Pierre Boulez, Ralf Weikert, and Paul Griffiths, among others, with leading orchestras across Europe and beyond. Wong won several Swiss recording prizes, as well as one -- after signing with Sony Classical -- from a Belgian music critics' group for his recording of music by Schubert. Wong has played and recorded various kinds of contemporary music, from works by the likes of Schoenberg, Ligeti, and Rihm, to his own piano arrangements of film scores. In 2016, these were issued by Sony in Piano Movie Lounge, Vol. 1, Piano Movie Lounge, Vol. 2, and Cinema Classics: The Piano at the Movies. All three were top European sellers, and Cinema Classics reached the number one spot on classical charts in the United Kingdom. Wong signed with the RCA Red Seal label and released his debut there, featuring chamber versions of concertos by Chopin and Beethoven, with the Gémeaux Quartet, in 2017. He released two albums of a Beethoven Trilogy of rare works in 2021, returning in 2022 on RCA with the album Mozart Minore, featuring Mozart's two minor-key piano concertos. ~ James Manheim, Rovi