Gloria Cheng

Pianist Gloria Cheng is noted for her work in contemporary music, which has, among other honors, brought her a Grammy Award. She is also an educator. Cheng has collaborated with several major contemporary composers, commissioning new works and performing in duo pieces with Terry Riley and Thomas Adès. Her recordings include the 2025 release Root Progressions, which featured notated works she had commissioned from jazz composers. Cheng was born in Teaneck, New Jersey. Her parents were from Shanghai. Her mother gave her piano lessons starting at four, but her family expected her to pursue a business-related career, and she majored in economics at Stanford University. After graduating, she still found herself interested in music and enrolled at UCLA, where she received an MFA in piano. She went on for further studies in piano and music theory in Paris, where, she told Stanford Magazine, she lived on "apples and brie." Cheng began an MBA program at UCLA but dropped out after one quarter and devoted herself to practicing. She earned a degree at the University of Southern California, where she studied with Aube Tzerko and John Perry. Cheng worked as an orchestra pianist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, a position that brought her into contact with major contemporary composers, including Pierre Boulez and György Ligeti. Since then, she has specialized in contemporary music. Cheng made her recording debut in 1995 on the Koch International label with an album of works by Messiaen. During this period, she also performed and recorded as Gloria Cheng-Cochran. Cheng made her debut as a soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1998 and performed with the group, at the personal invitation of Pierre Boulez, at its final concerts at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in 2003. She has appeared with various orchestras around the U.S. and in China. She has been especially visible as a recitalist at festivals, including California's Ojai Music Festival, the Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music in Massachusetts, and the Chautauqua Music Festival in New York State. Cheng has commissioned numerous contemporary works, including the two-piano Concert Paraphrase on Powder Her Face of Thomas Adès and Terry Riley's Cheng Tiger Growl Roar, both of which she performed with their composers. Among her many world premieres are those of Esa-Pekka Salonen's Dichotomie, John Adams' Hallelujah Junction, and the piano sonata of Steven Stucky; she memorialized the latter on the 2018 release Garlands for Steven Stucky. Cheng's 2016 film project MONTAGE: Great Film Composers and the Piano featured her performances of many other new works written for her and was widely viewed at festivals and on public television in southern California. She has recorded for Harmonia Mundi, Telarc, Bridge, and other labels. In 2025, Cheng released the album Root Progressions on the Biophilia label; it featured new commissions of notated works by jazz composers. Cheng was the Regents Lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley in 2012 and has served as adjunct faculty at UCLA. ~ James Manheim, Rovi