Sheng Cai, Piano

August 20, 2024

Recently described as “having the inner passion paired with Rubinstein’s nonchalance” by Thüringer Allgemeine in Germany, canadian pianist Sheng Cai has embraced the keyboard tradition which epitomizes the greatness of the romantic virtuoso. His performances of major keyboard works of the past centuries have touched audiences and won the praise of critics on four continents. 

He was a top-prize winner at many competitions throughout his teenage years, including the Montreal Symphony Orchestra Competition (Concours OSM), Toronto Symphony Piano Competition, The International Young Artists Competition of Colorado, The Bay State competition in Boston, and was the youngest finalist and special prize winner at the Bösendorfer International Piano Competition in the US.

Since winning the top prizes at Concour OSM (Montreal symphony competition) and Toronto Symphony’s competition at 15 years old, Sheng Cai has performed a broad spectrum of over 35 different piano concertos from Mozart to 21st century living composers with invitations to dozens of orchestras worldwide as guest soloist. Recent concerto performances include invitations to perform with the Toronto Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, Quebec Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic, Calgary Philharmonic, Edmonton Symphony, Memphis Symphony, Windsor Symphony, Canton Symphony of Ohio, and Fort Collins Symphony, among many others.

Sheng Cai is instrumental in advocating many neglected works that are peaks of the piano literature, works by composers such as Enescu, Kabalevsky, Kapustin, Medtner, Morawetz, Villa-Lobos and a number of his own works frequently shows up on his concert programs, his creative programming have made audience aware of such treasures of the piano literature deserves a wider audience.

Sheng Cai began his musical studies in Canada and US where he was a student at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto and the Juilliard School’s pre-college division in New York. He received his Bachelor of Music Degree under full scholarship at The New England Conservatory in Boston. His teachers and mentors include pianists Anton Kuerti, Gary Graffman and Russell Sherman.