Tianjin Juilliard Named as All-Steinway School

Tianjin's students will now play exclusively on the 120 Steinway pianos selected especially for the school

A new strategic partnership between The Tianjin Juilliard School and Steinway & Sons means that Tianjin Juilliard has been named as an All-Steinway School. The collaboration was unveiled on December 14, 2023 — on the same day that the school played host to the 11th Steinway National Youth Piano Competition Finals.

As a result of the partnership, Tianjin Juilliard students will play exclusively on Steinway pianos. Yoheved Kaplinsky (Chair of the Piano Department at Juilliard’s New York campus) and Xiaohan Wang (Chair of the Pre-College Piano Department at Tianjin Juilliard) journeyed to the Steinway factories in New York and Hamburg, ultimately selecting 120 instruments to be taken back to Tianjin.

Tianjin Juilliard opened its doors in the Fall of 2020, and is the first performing arts institution in China to offer US-accredited master's degrees — made possible through its partnership with The Juilliard School's New York campus.

Other All-Steinway Schools include Oberlin Conservatory, the Yale School of Music, the Cleveland Institute of Music, and the Curtis Institute of Music. The scheme is hugely historic, with Oberlin having been an All-Steinway School since 1877.

"The collaboration between Juilliard and Steinway extends from New York to Tianjin," said Wei He, the CEO and Artistic Director of Tianjin Juilliard. "At the inaugural Tianjin Juilliard Piano Festival in the summer of 2023, Steinway provided strong support in piano tuning and maintenance, sending three technicians to work alongside our team throughout the festival, impressing visiting artists with the pianos' excellent condition."

"The Tianjin Juilliard School and Steinway & Sons both pursue excellence, and today's signing ceremony marks a new beginning for our collaboration," he continued. "We look forward to further cooperation at the 2024 Tianjin Juilliard Piano Festival and exploring more possibilities for mutual support in artistic development."