About Yang Xuefei

The internationally acclaimed guitarist Yang Xuefei was the first guitarist in China to have graduated from the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing with a BA degree and the first guitarist from China to study classical guitar in the west.

The pioneering spirit of the Beijing-born, London-based musician has already been evident since her childhood. Born in Beijing, Xuefei began playing the guitar at the age of 7, taking formal tuition at 10 from Chen Zhi. Soon after, she made her first public appearance at the First China International Guitar Festival. Immediately she gained such acclaim that the Spanish ambassador in China presented her with a handmade concert guitar. During her school years, she played extensively in China, Hong Kong, Macau, Spain and Australia and gave concert tours in Taiwan, Japan and Portugal.

When playing in Tokyo, she was given a special award by the Guitar Alliance of Japan and the celebrated Japanese luthier Masaru Kohno presented her with one of his concert guitars. The composer Rodrigo attended her debut concert in Madrid when she was 14 and was so surprised that he commented that I can hardly believe that so beautiful performance was given by a 14-year-old girl. in 1995, when John Williams came to Beijing, he was so impressed with her playing that he gave two of his own Smallman guitars to her Conservatory especially for her and other top students to play. As the first Chinese student ever to receive an international scholarship from the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, Xuefei went to England for her postgraduate study at The Royal Academy of Music.

Xuefei has since then studied with Michael Lewin, John Mills and Timothy Walker at the Royal Academy of Music. She won the Dorothy Grinstead Prize and received the Principals prize for exceptional all-round studentship achieving a Recital Diploma. Xuefei was awarded the Dip.RAM---the highest performance award conferred by the Royal Academy. In 2005, her outstanding achievements helped her earn the Associate title granted by the Academy.

Yang Xuefei has given concerts throughout Europe, Asia and North America. Her success has led her to be invited to many prestigious venues including the Wigmore Hall, Purcell Room and Queen Elizabeth Hall in London as well as the Berliner Philharmonie, Musikhalle Hamburg, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Lincoln Center New York and the Herbst Theatre San Francisco. In Asia, she has appeared at the National Concert Hall Taipei, Hong Kong City Hall, Hong Kong Cultural Center, Esplanade Singapore, Guangzhou XingHai Concert Hall and Beijing Concert Hall. In 2003 she performed 54 concerts for the Night of the Proms Tour, appearing in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany to an estimated total audience of over 800,000. She also performed concertos with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic and Macao Orchestras.

Her second CD album Si Ji, inspired by music from China, was released in 2005 by GSP. Later that year, she signed an exclusive international contract with EMI Classics and her debut album Romance de Amor was released in April 2006, reaching gold disc status in Hong Kong. Her