Origins & Early Life

Lang Lang (Chinese: 郎朗; pinyin: Láng Lǎng; born 14 June 1982) is a Chinese classical pianist. He has performed with major orchestras around the world and appeared at many leading concert halls. Active since the 1990s, he was the first Chinese pianist to be engaged by the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic and many of the top American orchestras. He was also a judge on the first two series of the British music competition television series The Piano.

Pivotal Works & Achievements

Lang Lang was born in Shenyang, China, in 1982, to a family of the Manchu Niohuru clan. His father Lang Guoren is a musician who plays the erhu. Both his father and mother, also a musician, were displaced to work on rice farms in the country during the Cultural Revolution, before Lang was born. The Tom and Jerry episode The Cat Concerto, which features Franz Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2, motivated two-year-old Lang to learn the piano.

Enduring Legacy & Impact

He started lessons with Zhu Yafen at age three, won first place at the Shenyang Piano Competition and performed his first public recital when he was five. When Lang was nine, he was expelled from his piano tutor's studio for "lack of talent". Lang has stated that...

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