Biography

 Hillary S. has earned recognition in numerous competitions. She was recipient of the “Judges’ Award” for the American Protégé International Concerto Competition and was subsequently invited to perform in Carnegie Hall for the Gala Winners’ Concert. She was also a finalist of the National YoungArts Foundation and International Washington D.C. Competition. She received second prize in the 14th Biennial Los Angeles International Liszt Competition and a cash award, which led to a performance in the 2017 American Liszt Society Festival.

She has starred as a soloist with numerous orchestras in the United States and Europe. Her most notable concerto performance was with the Glendale Youth Orchestra, which led to a debut at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, after an audition with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Youth Orchestra Mentorship Partners.

Hillary is Co-founder of 5pm Series, a a charitable nonprofit organization that has aimed to provide financial support to musicians during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through this online concert series, she has helped organize over 150 concerts from across the world and crowdsourced nearly $15,000, most of which has been directed towards the musicians who performed on the series. This entrepreneurial endeavor was awarded $5,000 from the EXCELerator initiative, a program that supports promising student-led ventures.

Hillary has presented a solo benefit recital performing piano and violin to raise a total of $3,500 in funds to benefit the American Red Cross and Tzu Chi Foundation for the Tsunami Relief Effort. Additionally, she has provided voluntary piano lessons to children with various forms of autism. She has worked with students with a wide range of learning disabilities. She is a passionate and active teacher, having taught university piano courses, toddler group piano classes, and actively maintaining her private studio of students of all ages. She has presented her research topics at the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) conferences at the national and collegiate level. Additionally, her students have achieved distinguished marks at the Royal Conservatory of Music and ABRSM exams.

Hillary received her Doctoral and Master’s Degree in Piano Performance and Pedagogy at the University of Michigan with Dr. Logan Skelton and Dr. John Ellis. She received her Bachelor’s degree in piano performance under the tutelage of Yoshikazu Nagai at San Francisco Conservatory of Music. She has also worked with Bernadene Blaha and Ory Shihor and performed in many masterclasses for renowned pianists such as John Perry, Gary Graffman, Leon Fleisher, and Jerome Lowenthal. Hillary began piano studies with her mother.