About
Lauded for being “positively mesmerizing at the piano” by The Times-Tribune, Korean-American pianist MINJU CHOI WITTE has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia as a recitalist, orchestral soloist, and chamber musician. She has appeared as a soloist with the Indianapolis and Shreveport Symphonies, the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic, the Music Academy of the West and Juilliard Orchestras. Minju has been presented in recitals in cities in the U.S. and abroad, including Paris, New York City, Burgundy, Philadelphia, and Chicago. She has been presented in prestigious venues such as the Lincoln Center's David Geffen Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, Steinway Hall and the Vancouver Chamber Music Festival. She has been heard as a soloist and chamber musician in live and recorded performances on radio stations around the country including, WQXR New York Radio, WFMT Chicago Radio, WQSC Santa Barbara, KDAQ Shreveport and WICR Indianapolis. Minju was a featured artist at the Vancouver Recital Society’s Chamber Music Festival, in which her performances were broadcast on CBC Radio.
Her 2018 solo debut album Boundless (Navona Records) garnered her a feature review in Gramophone Magazine and has been performed on radio stations in New York, Washington, Canada, and Croatia. It features music by Philip Lasser, Gabriela Lena Frank and a commissioned work by Ching-chu Hu. She has commissioned a variety of works that have been written for her by American composers. She is featured in the 2022 album Passages (Navona Records) as a chamber musician. Notable performances of American works have included David Diamond’s Piano Concerto with conductor Gerard Schwarz and Philip Lasser’s piano sonata "The White Owls" at Schola Cantorum in Paris, which resulted in Minju's performance of the sonata becoming the centerpiece of a modern dance work with both the dancers and Minju performing together on stage presented at Lincoln Center and at Florence Gould Hall of the French Institute in New York City. She has also worked with American composers Derek Bermel, William Bolcom, and Joel Hoffman.
Committed to the education of young pianists and arts advocacy, Minju has created numerous community music engagement programs at schools and public hospitals. She has served as an adjucator at various MTNA State Competitions, Carmel Klavier International Competition, and Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra’s Concerto Competition. She has previously served as the chair of the MTNA/MMTA (Missouri) Piano Performance Competition. Through her vision, she created the Community Music Service Fellowship at Eskenazi Hospital, Indiana’s largest public service hospital, which provides opportunities for university music students and faculty artists to uniquely contribute their talents by providing free concerts to its visitors. She has served on the Missouri Arts Council's Music Advisory Panel and on the Indiana Arts Commission’s Strategic Planning Committee. She has given masterclasses and pedagogy lectures at universities across the U.S. including at West Virginia University, University of Iowa, Butler University, University of Memphis, and Brigham Young University. She has similarly taught in S. Korea at Gwangju University and at Honam Christian University. In 2021, Minju was appointed to serve on the Research and Diversity Committees of the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy, hosted by the Frances Clark Center for Keyboard Pedagogy. Minju has served on the piano faculty at Missouri State University in Springfield, Missouri. While at MSU, she created its Young Artists Keyboard Academy; a summer program for pre-college keyboardists. She was the recipient of several faculty grant awards, including a major equipment funding grant which allowed her to create a new keyboard lab for music major students. She was also showcased on the MSU’s faculty research magazine and video, Mind’s Eye highlighting her work as both a teacher and a performer (link).
The South Korean-born, Indiana-bred pianist has been awarded prizes in several competitions including first prize in the Nena Wideman International Piano Competition, the Music Academy of the West Concerto Competition and the Juilliard Concerto Competition. Minju was also a winner in the National YoungArts Foundation Competition. Her students have been prize winners of piano competitions, including Indiana Hoosier Auditions, Lafayette Symphony Orchestra’s Keller Concerto Competition, University of Indianapolis Concerto Competition, and the Carmel Klavier International Competition. She earned her bachelor´s and master´s degrees from The Juilliard School under the tutelage of Jerome Lowenthal. She pursued additional studies with Jean-Claude Pennetier at École Normale de Musique de Paris and with Bernd Goetzke at Hochschule für Musik, Theater, und Medien Hannover in Germany. She received her doctoral degree at Stony Brook University in New York.
Minju currently resides in Indianapolis. Her mission as an artist and educator is to foster meaningful connections with others through the universal language of music.
Gramophone
“Minju Choi is a Korean-American pianist who has made a speciality of new American music in her recitals, so it is appropriate that for her debut solo disc she has recorded three new works…The sonata-form opening movement, meditative central span and concluding toccata are terrifically well realised by Choi…it is the most characterful work in the programme and Choi plays it superbly."
