Instruments: Piano
Style: Classical
Education:
Bachelor and Master of Music, Tokyo Gakugei University, Japan
Artist Diploma in Piano Performance, Ball State University, Indiana
Doctorate in Piano Performance, Ball State University, Indiana
As a pianist, Yuka Nakayama has gained a significant variety of performing experiences, and has given many recitals in Japan and the United States. Some of her most recent performances include venues in Indiana, Illinois, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and California. Aside from her solo recitals, she has played in recital with Ball State University professor of viola, Philip Tietze, several chamber groups including piano quartets and quintets, and have collaborated with a great number of vocalists and instrumentalists. She continues to engage music from our time, and has performed in a number of premier performances of new compositions. She is also an active participant in international piano competitions: She passed through the preliminary rounds and competed in the 2007 Louisiana International Piano Competition and the 2009 Virginia Waring International Piano Competition. Her upcoming competition is the 2010 Third International Piano Competition of Slavic Music in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Yuka currently holds three degrees/diplomas in music, including a BM and MM in piano with an emphasis on education and pedagogy from Tokyo Gakugei University, and the Artist Diploma in piano performance from Ball State University. She graduated summa cum laude in her master's degree. The projected completion date for her doctoral degree in piano performance is May 2011. Yuka has a considerable background of teaching experience at the university level, as well as with younger students on a serious music career track. Beyond holding a full assistantship in piano at Ball State University for the last five years, she has also taught piano at Anderson University and Tokyo Gakugei University, for a total of eight years of university teaching experience. She has also served as a piano instructor at a specialized music high school in Tokyo where she helped students prepare for college entrance auditions, plus she has long maintained a private studio. She has also substituted as an ear-training and music theory instructor at Ball State University.
Her primary teachers include Takamichi Kobayashi, Hiromi Takazawa, and Ray Kilburn.