Four Prestigious US Music Schools Excited about Sylvia

Eighteen-year-old Auckland pianist Sylvia Jiang has been offered full scholarships to four prestigious American music school: Juilliard School, Yale School of Music, Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University and New England Conservatory.

Jiang started learning the piano at age 4 and never imagined her hobby would take her so far.

“I had no way of foreseeing the future and whether I was even going to be good at this or not. I was definitely not one of those young child prodigies who could play all their Mozart sonatas by age 11, I just wasn’t that person,” the former St Cuthbert’s College student says.

Jiang is one of only a handful of New Zealand undergraduate students to ever be offered a spot at Juilliard but has yet to decide which offer she will accept.

Last year, while completing year 13, she also studied a Bachelor of Music in Classical Performance under Auckland University’s Young Scholars programme.

She will continue studying for the rest of the semester before heading to America later this year.

Original article by Rose Cawley, Stuff, May 14, 2014.