RAFF, JOACHIM (1822–1882)

Hyelim Kim is a prizewinner of major international piano competitions, including the Clara Haskil (Vevey) and Arcangelo Speranza (Taranto) International Piano Competitions, Hastings International Piano Concerto Competition, Les Étoiles du Piano (Roubaix), and the Annarosa Taddei International Competition (Rome). She made her orchestral debut at the age of ten with the Filarmonica ‘Mihail Jora’ Bacău and has since appeared with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Southbank Sinfonia, Zermatt Festival Orchestra, Orchestre de Picardie, Gürzenich Orchester Köln and Orchestre Philharmonique du Maroc, among others. Kim has performed in Korea and across Europe at venues such as the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Tonhalle Düsseldorf, Kölner Philharmonie, Flagey Brussels and TivoliVredenburg Utrecht. She has been invited to perform at festivals including Piano Folies du Touquet, Festival de Saint-Riquier and Musica Nigella. Born in South Korea, she began learning the piano at the age of five and moved to Germany at seventeen to study with Georg Friedrich Schenck. Kim holds a Bachelor’s degree from the Robert Schumann Hochschule Düsseldorf and a Master’s degree from the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln, where she is continuing her Konzertexamen with Claudio Martínez-Mehner and Nina Tichman. In 2023, she received a scholarship from Fondation Clavarte in Bern.

The reputation of Joseph Joachim Raff was once so high that during the 1860s and 1870s he was regarded by many as the foremost symphonist of his day. His breakthrough came in 1863 when both his First Symphony and a cantata won major prizes. From then on his reputation rose inexorably until in 1877 he became the founding director of the prestigious Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt. Although primarily known, then as now, as a symphonist, Raff was prolific in most genres; operas, choral works, chamber music and songs abound in his catalogue but by far his largest output was for the piano: there are over 130 works for the instrument, many of them with multiple movements or numbers.