Meadowmount School of Music and the Grange Concert Series present
KENTO HONG
2024 Gurrena Fellow
with pianist Taketo Kataoka
Sunday, May 18
3:00pm
Reception at Whitcomb’s follows the concert
$10 suggested donation
The Grange Concert Series welcomes our annual collaboration with the Meadowmount School of Music in bringing the outstanding talent of Kento Hong, the 2024 Gurrena Fellowship winner, to our stage. The Gurrena Fellowship was created in 2022 in memory of David A. Barnebl, an educated, passionate music lover, by his wife, Linda Gurrena Barnebl, of Shelburne. The purpose of the Fellowship is to support and encourage exceptionally talented students to become abundantly successful in their professional journey.
Kento Hong will be accompanied by pianist Taketo Kataoka in a program featuring Korngold’s cinematic concerto and works by Amy Beach, Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson, and Hubay.
Kento Hong was born in New York and began his violin studies at age 6 in California under Aimee Kreston. At age 7, he made his orchestral debut in Los Angeles and has been a student of the Juilliard pre-college division since age 10. He continues to study under Dr. Ann Setzer at the Juilliard School.
Kento is a Grand 4th prize laureate of the 2021 Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition, a finalist and audience prize laureate of the 2022 Thomas and Evon Cooper International Violin Competition, and a 3rd prize finalist of the 2024 Arthur Grumiaux International Violin Competition. He has also won first prizes in other competitions, including the Chicago International Competition, the Camarata Artists International Competition, and the Chappaqua Orchestra Concerto Competition.
In late 2024, Kento was awarded the inaugural $50,000 Gurrena Fellowship career grant from the Meadowmount School of Music. Kento Hong is a 2025 National Young Arts Finalist with distinction, a guest artist featured on NPR’s From The Top, a Back to Bach Soloist mentor, and a full scholarship recipient of the Meadowmount School of Music. He is the 2024-5 winner of the Juilliard pre-college concerto competition. Additionally, he is a frequently selected concertmaster of the leading Juilliard Pre-college orchestra, symphony, and ensemble.
Kento has performed in several major venues in New York City, including Carnegie Hall, Merkin Hall, Lincoln Center, and Alice Tully Hall. He has shared the stage with Jaime Laredo, Sharon Robinson, Robert McDuffie, Maxim Vengerov, and the Oxford Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall. He was selected as an active finalist participant in the Kronberg Academy Masterclass 2023 and has had masterclasses with Anne Akiko Meyers, Paul Kantor, Miriam Fried, Almita and Roland Vamos, Daniel Phillips, James Ehnes, Joseph Lin, Sihao He, David Kim, Robert McDuffie, Lawrence Dutton, Annie Fullard, Kikuei Ikeda, Dmitri Sitkovetsky, and Elmar Oliveira.
Alongside his violin studies, Kento Hong is an avid researcher and public communicator. As a guest artist on NPR’s From The Top Show 441, he discussed the interdisciplinary connection between science and art through his osteoarthritis research at Columbia Engineering School. In 2024, as a US national finalist delegate, Kento was the Grand 2nd prize laureate of Regeneron’s International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) competition in the Biomedical Engineering category and received the Serving Society through Science Special Award. He was also the recipient of the Excellency in Medical Research Award.