Ira Hsiao

Ira Hsiao is the founder and president of Rêve de Musique.  He is a four-time Gold Medalist from the International Young Musicians Competition, 2021 and Passion of Music 2020, 2021 & 2022, American Association for Development of the Gifted and Talented (AADGT);  2nd place winner (2020) of Golden Era of Romantic Music International Competition (American Fine Arts Festival); 3rd place winner (2019) of International Competition of Romantic Music; and 2nd place winner of International Music Talent Competition (2020), American Protégé.  Ira made his debut in a Carnegie Hall performance at age 14.  Born in Santa Barbara, California, Ira began taking piano lessons at age 4 with his mother. In first grade, he started participating in piano competitions. Since then, he won second place awards in the accelerated category of DeBose National Piano Competition every year from 2012 to 2018, and third place award in 2019. Ira was also awarded “Best of the Youngest” at the Chopin Youth International Piano Competition, 2013. Since first grade, Ira received a gold medal award every year from the Texas Music Teachers Association theory test (2011-2023).  Ira participated at the National Piano Guild (10 pieces, National Winner’s category) from 2010 to 2013 in which he was awarded all Superior Plus, the Top-Talent Circle ranking. Throughout his elementary school years, he received all superior plus ratings from ADMTA’s Baroque- Classical Festival and Romantic-Contemporary Festival. Ira also performed at many honors recitals at the Jessen Auditorium at the Butler School of Music, University of Texas at Austin. Besides music, Ira also enjoys drawing, filming, and aviation studies. 

At age 15, Ira was accepted into Orford Musique, 2021 (for ages 18-30 college and graduate school music majors), a classical summer music festival in Canada for young, serious musicians, and studied with 5 piano professors (Anton Nel, David Jalbert, Jimmy Briére, Ronan O’Hora and Sara Davis Buechner) from the USA, Canada, and the UK. Ira was selected to perform in the Rising Stars Concert twice at Orford Musique, 2021.

At age 16, Ira was awarded a scholarship and completed the Music Industry Essentials Certificate program, which is a partnership between Clive David Institute, Billboard, and Yellowbrick at New York University.  This program consists of multiple hours of online classes with several projects and exams that each student needs to complete.  It provided one full year for students to complete the entire course, but Ira completed it in less than a month and received his Certificate.

In 2021, Ira was invited to have a professional recording done by AADGT at NV Recording Studio in New Jersey. He was also invited by the American Association for the Development of the Gifted and Talented to perform at two Winners Recitals at Carnegie Hall in New York City on April 10 & June 19, 2022.

For the Advanced Placement Music Theory Exam by College Board in May, 2022, Ira received all perfect scores (5) in all categories (Aural sub-score: 5, Non-Aural sub-score: 5, Overall score: 5). Ira served as the Teaching Assistant for both Piano Class (2021-23), and AP Music Theory Class (2022-23) at Westwood High School & he was awarded Outstanding Piano Student for Senior Award from Westwood High School in May, 2023.

Ira was invited to attend the Admitted Students Day with Full Travel Grants from Eastman School of Music in April, 2023. In June 2023, he received the Loving-Mansfield Gold Medal Theory Award, which is an award given for receiving a total of 12 Gold Medals from the Annual TMTA Theory Tests (Grades 1-12) at the Texas Music Teachers Association Convention.

Ira is an undergraduate student majoring Piano Performance at Eastman School of Music with Dean’s Performance Award Scholarship for 4 years (the highest honor of scholarship award), and Eastman Artist Scholarship in the studio of Dr. Joseph Rackers, while minoring in German at University of Rochester in New York.

Ira got accepted to study in Eastman’s Honors Theory and Musicianship Class that teaches graduate-level music theory. This is a highly selective group in which only a few first year undergraduate students are chosen by testing their music theory, ear-training, sight-singing, and analytical techniques.