About
Singaporean harpist Lishan Tan is a talented young musician who has performed across the world. Most notably, she has collaborated with the Silk Road Ensemble in performance with the Boston Conservatory Orchestra at the Boston Symphony Hall. Lishan has performed as a soloist with Boston Conservatory's Conductor's Orchestra and Nanyang Academy of Fine Art's Chamber Recital Series. She was also the featured harpist at Boston Conservatory’s Combined Choruses Concert in December 2018 where she was the sole accompanist to the chorus for Britten’s Ceremony of Carols, Brahms’ 4 Gesänge and Rheinberger’s Psalm 84. Her most recent achievements include being awarded the First Ever Judges' Honourable Mention at Boston Conservatory's 2019/2020 Concerto Competition and Honourable Mention at the 2020 Brookline Symphony Orchestra's Concerto Competition, both with Alberto Ginastera's Harp Concerto.
The harp has taken Lishan from places like Müenchenbuchsee, Switzerland to the Boston Public Library and
Singapore's Gardens by the Bay. She has performed with many of New England's and Singapore's leading
ensembles such as The Philharmonic Orchestra (Singapore), Singapore Lyric Opera and the New England
Philharmonic under the musical direction of various conductors such as Bruce Hangen, Johann de Meij, Andrew Altenbach, Richard Pittman and Lim Yau. Lishan also enjoys bringing music to the local community. She was selected to perform at numerous local events such as “The Future of Us” Exhibition, which celebrated Singapore’s 50th Anniversary; the 2015 National Citizenship Ceremony; and “Hearts and Hugs,” a television programme which featured celebrities organising a fundraiser to help children in need. Through her performances, Lishan has had the privilege to perform for Singapore’s Seventh President, Dr Tony Tan, Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong and Senior Minister Teo Chee Hean.
As an advocate of showing how versatile the harp can be, Lishan seeks to perform non-standard harp repertoire and collaborates with composers to premiere new works for harp. Her long term project is conducting "Writing for Harp" workshops for composers to better understand how to write for the instrument and encourage more harp repertoire to be written. She has conducted her workshop both in Singapore and Boston, the most recent being Berklee College of Music's Film Scoring Network. On the side, Lishan continues to explore extended techniques of the harp through non-traditional ways. Her recent YouTube video, where she used the harp and its various timbres to recreate sounds from a video game, surpassed 1 million views in under two months. Although these projects different from performing traditional harp repertoire, Lishan hopes that the new perspectives can enhance the appreciation of the harp to a higher level.
Lishan took to the harp at 14 years old and entered the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) in 2013. With the support of the Lucien Wang Scholarship (2016-2018), she continued her undergraduate studies under the NAFA-Royal College of Music (RCM) joint degree program and studied under Huang Yu-Hsin, second harpist of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. Lishan was conferred the Best Graduate Award upon graduating top of her class in both her diploma and undergraduate years. She was additionally awarded the NAFA Chairman Award and RCM Musical Excellence Award for her academic excellence. In pursuit of her harp education, Lishan has also travelled internationally to attend masterclasses and festivals. She participated in Festival MusicAlps 2018 in Tignes, France HarpMasters 2019 in Müenchenbuchsee, Switzerland and was most recently chosen to attend Bowdoin International Festival (Online) in 2020. She has studied in Boston, London, France, Switzerland, Malaysia and Singapore with harpists such as Jana Boušková, Sylvain Blassel, Milda Agazarian, Park Stickney, Petra van der Heide, Isabelle Moretti, Catherine Michel and Sasha Boldachev.
Lishan holds a Diploma with Distinction in Music Teaching from NAFA and a Bachelor of Music with First Class Honours from The Royal College of Music, London. She has recently graduated with a Master of Music in Harp Performance from the Boston Conservatory at Berklee under the tutelage of renowned harpists Ina Zdorovetchi and Dr. June Han.
Short Biography
Singaporean harpist Lishan Tan is a talented young musician who has performed across the world. Most notably, she has collaborated with the Silk Road Ensemble in performance with The Boston Conservatory Orchestra. Lishan has performed as a soloist with BoCo's Conductor's Orchestra and Nanyang Academy of Fine Art's Chamber Recital Series. Her most recent achievements include winning the First Ever Judges' Honourable Mention at BoCo’s 2019 Concerto Competition and Honourable Mention at Brookline Symphony Orchestra's 2020 Concerto Competition. Lishan has performed with Boston and Singapore's leading ensembles and also enjoys bringing music to the community. She was selected to perform at “The Future of Us'' Exhibition, which celebrated Singapore’s 50th Anniversary; the 2015 National Citizenship Ceremony; and “Hearts and Hugs,” a television broadcast where celebrities organised a fundraiser for children in need. Lishan has had the privilege to perform for Singapore’s Seventh President and Senior Ministers. Upon graduating top of her class in her diploma and degree years, Lishan was additionally awarded the NAFA Chairman Award and RCM Musical Excellence Award. She holds a BMus from Royal College of Music and MM from Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Lishan will be pursuing her DMA at New England Conservatory in the Fall.