Leon Chen
Bio
Born in Auckland, New Zealand, 26-year-old pianist and conductor Leon Chen is a fellow at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He moved to the UK in 2018 on the Gill Culpin Scholarship to study piano with Mei-ting Sun and conducting with Sian Edwards and Dominic Grier, completing both his Bachelor and Master of Music degrees with First-Class Honours. He also received the DipRAM award for outstanding performance excellence. He has collaborated with orchestras including the Brighton Philharmonic, Worthing Philharmonic, and Chineke! Orchestra, and was awarded the Accompanist’s Prize at the 2023 Bicentenary Awards at Wigmore Hall, where he has also appeared in solo recital.
Other engagements include appearances at the Savonlinna Music Festival, the Moniuszko Vocal Competition, the Shanghai International Music Competition (as a prize winner), and the Lucerne Festival. He has also been invited to the London Young Talent Festival and the London Chinese New Year Gala. As a collaborative pianist, he has worked with Carshalton Opera and Royal Academy Opera, assisting productions such as Die Zauberflöte, Carmen, Rinaldo, Wozzeck, and Hänsel und Gretel. In New Zealand, he won the Asia-Pacific Musician Association Competition, the LECT Alice Cole Scholarship, and was joint winner of the New Zealand National Concerto Competition.
In September 2026, he joined the Mascarade Opera Programme in Florence as an Emerging Artist.
