Kate Vo

Kate is a 15 year old violinist and pianist. She has been playing the violin since age 4 and the piano since age 6. She currently studies with Chen Zhao and Boxianzi Vivian Ling for violin, and is a student of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music pre-college. She is a member of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and the Young Chamber Musicians program. Kate has received awards for numerous violin and piano competitions, including the 2025 YoungArts National Arts Competition. She has performed in venues including Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Seiji Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood, Bing Concert Hall in Stanford University, and Merkin Concert Hall at Kaufman Music Center in NYC, and has been invited to perform internationally. Currently, she serves as the Associate Regional Director of the Palo Alto region of the Back to Bach Project.

For violin, Kate has previously won 1st prize for the East Coast International Music Competition, VIVO International Music Competition, Elite International Music Competition, Prima Volta Music Competition, New York Artists International Music Competition, US International Open Music Competition, Charleston International Music Competition, Grand Prize Virtuoso International Music Competition with an invitation to perform in Salzburg, and the Vienna Virtuoso Music Competition with the Judge's Best Performance Award and an invitation to perform in Berlin, where she was awarded the Best Performance Award of the evening within the Gala concert. Additionally, she has been recognized as an award winner of the 2025 YoungArts National Arts Competition. For piano, Kate has received awards from competitions of the Piano Teachers Society of America and the Glory International Music Competition, and was awarded for both instruments in multiple competitions from the Great Composers Competition Series. Previously, she has played in masterclasses with Jessie Montgomery and Nathan Cole.

Kate was selected as co-concertmaster of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute 2024 Young Artists Orchestra and concertmaster of the CMEA Bay Section Winter Conference 2023 Honors Orchestra. She has also performed in the 2023 CASMEC All-State Junior High String Orchestra, the 2023 CODA December Honors Symphony Orchestra, and the 2024 CASMEC All-State High School Symphony Orchestra. In the summer of 2023, she performed in the Idyllwild Art Academy Chamber Music Intensive.

Other than music, Kate is a sophomore at Palo Alto High School. She can speak Japanese as a second language. In her free time, she likes to play tennis, compose or arrange music, write poems or stories, and discover the world.