12 Year old Star of the Show

14 Feb 2012

The Royal Hospital School, Holbrook, held their annual Scholar’s Concert on Wednesday 8 February and the Burns Recital Hall was packed.

Peter Crompton, Director of Music, said, “this event was a celebration of musical talent. The repertoire was wide and varied and gave all the pupils, irrespective of their level of achievement, the opportunity to perform”.

The star of the show was, undoubtedly, 12 year old Rion Shirayanagi, who stunned the audience with his performance of a Schubert sonata, Impromptu in Eb Major.
Rion joined the Royal Hospital School in January 2012 from the Shizuoka region of Japan. He started playing the piano aged just 3 years old encouraged by his mother who herself was a music graduate. He has his own grand piano at home and since the age of 5 he has been having lessons with Mrs Akiko Kodaka who is a Professor at the prestigious Tokyo University of Arts or Geidai. In 2009, Rion won his first national accolade at the Chopin Asia Competition and in 2011 he won a prize at the PIARA National Piano competition.
As well as taking part in life both inside and outside the classroom at the Royal Hospital School, Rion is managing to find time to practice the piano for at least one hour every day. His dream is to master the most famous in piano repertoire and shining examples of Russian musicianship Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto.

Peter Crompton goes on to say, “Rion is an inspiration and when he steps up to the piano pupils, musical and otherwise, are in awe. With this young man’s dedicated and from what we have witnessed so far, I am positive that he will achieve much.”