Uploaded June 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Cliburn Backstage with Greg Anderson ( @gregandersonpiano )
Interviews, curation, and editing by Greg Anderson
Seventeenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
May 21–June 7, 2025
Kotaro Shigemori, Japan, 25
cliburn.org/competitions/2025-cliburn-competition/2025-competitors/kotaro-shigemori
About Kotaro
Kotaro Shigemori began piano lessons with his mother when he was 6, and his passion and talent for the instrument grew quickly. He earned a bachelor’s and artist diploma from Toho Gakuen College in Tokyo under Michiko Okamoto and Katsurako Mikami, and won many national competition prizes in Japan. He says that placing at the Long-Thibaud International Competition in 2022 gave him great motivation and strength; it was at that moment that he could see himself as “a pianist who could be active in the world.”
Kotaro then moved to France in 2023 to study with Rena Shereshevskaya at the École normale de musique de Paris, Alfred Cortot. Over the last two years, he’s published six columns in Piano Magazine (Japan) about his experiences studying abroad. In addition to appearances at the La Folle Journée, Miyazaki International Music Festival, Ishikawa, and Wind and Green Music Festival, he’s performed at Suntory Hall with the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, Ishikawa Prefectural Concert Hall with the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa, Fukui Concert Hall with Aichi Central Symphony Orchestra, and Paris’ Théâtre du Châtelet with Orchestre de la Garde républicaine. Through performance, he believes musicians “should cherish the feeling of healing the hearts of the listeners.” He was awarded the Ezaki Scholarship in 2023, and the Rohm Music Foundation and Ezoe Memorial Recruit Scholarships in 2024 and 2025.
Cliburn Backstage with Greg Anderson ( @gregandersonpiano )
Interviews, curation, and editing by Greg Anderson
Seventeenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
May 21–June 7, 2025
Kotaro Shigemori, Japan, 25
cliburn.org/competitions/2025-cliburn-competition/2025-competitors/kotaro-shigemori
About Kotaro
Kotaro Shigemori began piano lessons with his mother when he was 6, and his passion and talent for the instrument grew quickly. He earned a bachelor’s and artist diploma from Toho Gakuen College in Tokyo under Michiko Okamoto and Katsurako Mikami, and won many national competition prizes in Japan. He says that placing at the Long-Thibaud International Competition in 2022 gave him great motivation and strength; it was at that moment that he could see himself as “a pianist who could be active in the world.”
Kotaro then moved to France in 2023 to study with Rena Shereshevskaya at the École normale de musique de Paris, Alfred Cortot. Over the last two years, he’s published six columns in Piano Magazine (Japan) about his experiences studying abroad. In addition to appearances at the La Folle Journée, Miyazaki International Music Festival, Ishikawa, and Wind and Green Music Festival, he’s performed at Suntory Hall with the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, Ishikawa Prefectural Concert Hall with the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa, Fukui Concert Hall with Aichi Central Symphony Orchestra, and Paris’ Théâtre du Châtelet with Orchestre de la Garde républicaine. Through performance, he believes musicians “should cherish the feeling of healing the hearts of the listeners.” He was awarded the Ezaki Scholarship in 2023, and the Rohm Music Foundation and Ezoe Memorial Recruit Scholarships in 2024 and 2025.
