Silks, Strings, & Serenade

Taichi Fukumura is the Music Director of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra (ISO) and the current Assistant Conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra appointed by Franz Welser-Möst. A rising Japanese American conductor acclaimed for his dynamic stage presence and musical finesse, Fukumura is the Second Prize Winner of The Mahler Competition 2023, and a four-time recipient of the Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award.

Recent and upcoming international engagements include guest conducting debuts with the Bamberg Symphony and the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony. Fukumura will lead concerts with The Cleveland Orchestra this season as part of his new position, including a collaboration with Itzhak Perlman on tour in Miami. He also returned to the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra as guest conductor, where he previously conducted over 110 concerts as an Assistant Conductor appointed by Robert Spano. Other recent guest debuts include the Utah Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Chicago Philharmonic, Eugene Symphony, Delaware Symphony, and Colorado Springs Philharmonic.

As the Music Director of the Illinois Symphony, Fukumura has led an ongoing initiative to broaden the repertoire of the orchestra. Focusing on well-balanced, impactful programming, he has highlighted the work of living composers including Brian Raphael Nabors, Christopher Theofanidis, Stacy Garrop, and Gala Flagello. The 2025/26 season includes the world premiere of a new work by Michelle Isaac, commissioned by the ISO.

Fukumura served as the Assistant Conductor of the Chicago Sinfonietta where he previously received mentorship from Music Director Mei-Ann Chen as a Freeman Conducting Fellow. He also returned to the Aspen Music Festival as guest assistant conductor following a summer as a conducting fellow and was invited by Barbara Hannigan to assist at the Munich Philharmonic and the Musikkollegium Winterthur in Switzerland.

Born in Tokyo, Taichi Fukumura spent his childhood in Boston and began music studies at age three on the violin. He holds a Bachelor of Music in violin performance from Boston University, and both Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in orchestral conducting from Northwestern University under the mentorship of Victor Yampolsky. He is a recipient of the Concert Artists Guild Richard S. Weinert Award. Fukumura is fluent in both English and Japanese.

Pipa master, composer, educator, and improviser Gao Hong graduated from the Central Conservatory of Music, where she studied with pipa (Chinese lute) master Lin Shicheng. Since coming to the U.S., she has performed at numerous prestigious venues and festivals throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia and South America, including the Lincoln Center Festival, Carnegie Hall, San Francisco Jazz Festival, New Wave Festival, the Smithsonian, Teatro Colon, and festivals in Paris, Caen, Milan, Perth, Lisbon, and Zaragoza and Ronda, Spain. She has presented concerti for the pipa with the Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, South Netherlands Philharmonic (Philzuid), Heidelberg Philharmonic, Buenos Aires Philharmonic, Louisville Orchestra, Women’s Philharmonic, Hawaii Symphony, Maryland Symphony, Anchorage Symphony, University of Texas at Austin Wind Ensemble, and many others.

Gao has received numerous top awards and honors, including a prestigious Bush Artist Fellowship, five McKnight Artist Fellowships for Performing Musicians, a Sorel Medallion in Recording, a Sally Award from the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts, and numerous other grants and fellowships. Her albums have received 13 Gold Medals from the Global Music Awards and in 2025 she was inducted into the Transglobal World Music Hall of Fame. St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter proclaimed April 3, 2022, as “Gao Hong Day in the City of St. Paul” in honor of her milestone concert at the Ordway Center celebrating her 50 years of playing music with friends.  She is the author of the first pipa method book written in English, published and distributed worldwide by Hal Leonard.

As a composer, Gao’s commissions include those from the Minnesota Orchestra, The “President’s Own” United States Marine Band, Maestro Jerry Junkin and the University of Texas Wind Band, the American Composers Forum, Minnesota Sinfonia, LADYBAND’s 45-partner Consortium Commission, Newfound Chamber Winds, and many others. In December 2024, Gao recorded four pipa concerti she composed and orchestrated at Abbey Road Studios with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Her album, Symphony of Self, was released in January 2026 by Naxos and she introduced it with the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra to an over-capacity crowd at Temple Church in London. She was also the first Chinese musician to perform the National Anthem at an NBA basketball game, doing so on pipa for the Minnesota Timberwolves in Minneapolis.

Gao has served as a board member for the American Composers Forum and Minnesota Citizens for the Arts, and as a Governor of the Recording Academy Chicago Chapter. She also teaches at Carleton College, where she is Director of the Chinese Music Ensemble, and serves as Guest Professor at the Central Conservatory of Music, China Conservatory, Tianjin Conservatory, and other conservatories in China.

“For over 50 years, Gao Hong’s music has inspired and moved countless people around the globe. As one of the premier pipa players in the world, her illustrious career is filled with accomplishments as a musician, composer, and educator.”
– Amy Klobuchar, United States Senator