24/25 Season Highlights

• Debut at Royal Opera House Covent Garden with Tosca

• Debut with Boston Symphony Orchestra

• Leading San Francisco Opera productions of Un ballo in maschera, Tristan und Isolde, Idomeneo, and Beethoven’s Ninth

• Orchestral engagements with Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano, Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Seville , and Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid

• Return to Staatsoper Berlin with Simon Boccanegra

Biographical Info

• Born 23 October 1980 in Seoul, Korea

• BM in Composition from Yonsei University in Seoul, Korea

• MM in Orchestral Conducting from Yonsei University

• Doctorate of Music in Orchestral Conducting from University of Music in Stuttgart, Germany

• Apprenticed as Assistant Conductor at Teatro Real Madrid 

• Lives in San Francisco

Career Highlights

• Appointed Caroline H. Hume Music Director of San Francisco Opera

• Assisted Kiril Petrenko conducting Tristan und Isolde in Lyon

• First Prize in the International Jesús López Cobos Conducting Competition

• Culture Prize from the Ingrid zu Solms Foundation

• Special Prize from Deutschen Dirigentenpreis

• Named the Classical Music Breakout Star of 2021 by The New York Times

• Nominated for a 2022 International Opera Award in the Conductor category

• Awarded the 2024 Kyung-Ahm Prize in the Arts

Anecdotes

• Started as composition student and pianist; professor urged her to consider conducting after seeing her coach La bohème

• Is a particular fan of repertoire that blends Western classical music with Korean traditions

• Grandfather was a famous calligrapher who created the Wongok style

• Shares her name with a professional soccer player, as well as the author of a North Korean memoir

• Considered a career as a simultaneous translator; speaks Korean, English, Spanish, German, Italian, and French

• When working on a new piece, researches the composer’s life and the society in which they live(d) in their native language, so she can steep herself in the sounds and rhythms of their world