Photo by Carlin Hara-Crockford, 2024
Brisbane-born flautist and ANAM Alumna (2021), Lilly Yang is currently completing a Masters of Music/Woodwind - Flute at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln, Germany under the tutelage of Robert Winn. She has also performed in the masterclasses, in part supported by the PPCA Performers Trust Grant (2023), of renowned flute professors, Jacques Zoon (Adriatic Woodwinds Festival 2023), Robert Winn (Oxford Flute Summer School 2023), Sophie Cherrier and Julien Beaudiment (Nice International Summer Academy 2022). Lilly is currently a casual flautist with Orchestra Victoria (OV), Melbourne Chamber Orchestra (MCO), Queensland Symphony Orchestra (QSO) and the Canberra Symphony Orchestra (CSO).
Lilly completed her training at the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) in 2021 under the guidance of Virginia Taylor and Joshua Batty. ANAM is the only professional performance training institution of its kind in Australia, and one of few in the world. Musicians at ANAM perform in over 180 events in a year and receive more than 60 hours of one-on-one training as well as hundreds of hours of coaching from esteemed national and international guest artists.
Lilly is passionate about bringing music to the community and does so by maintaining a number of active chamber recitals. Of note, her work in Brisbane with harpist, Tijana Kozarcic, as the Estrel Duo has seen her perform at the Brisbane Town Hall, Queensland Parliament House, Old Museum Building, the Queensland Harp Society and the Holy Trinity Church, where they presented a sold-out concert titled Fantasies (2021). Following this success, they embarked on a follow-up concert tour series in early 2022 titled Dances for Flute & Harp. This series included performances at the Maleny Community Centre (Sunshine Coast), St Andrew's Uniting Church (Brisbane) and Trinity Lutheran Church (Gold Coast). Estrel Duo presented their debut recital to Melbourne audiences in July 2022 at the Auburn Uniting Church and most recently, at the Burgh House & Hampstead Museum in London, UK in November 2024.
In 2021, Lilly participated as a finalist in the Australian Youth Classical Music Competition. Shortly after, she was also awarded 2nd prize in the flute category of the Medici International Music Competition (Masters). Notable concerts that Lilly was a part of during 2021 included ANAM's Mostly Mozart program that was delivered to audiences through the Melbourne Digital Concert Hall and award-winning Melbourne-based opera company, IOpera's production of Mozart's Così fan tutte.
During Lilly's time at ANAM, she performed with the Western Australian Symphony Orchestra (WASO) under the baton of Simone Young and the Queensland Symphony Orchestra (QSO) for a successful season of the Bolshoi Ballet Jewels Performances (2019). As part of her professional development program, Lilly performed regularly as part of ANAM's orchestral & chamber ensembles in Melbourne. With these groups Lilly has performed at some renowned Melbourne venues such as the Melbourne Recital Centre (MRC), Melbourne Convention Exhibition Centre (MCEC), the Ian Potter Centre and South Melbourne Town Hall. Lilly's highlights in 2019 included winning best performance of an Australian Work at ANAM for Carl Vine’s Flute Sonata (2019); being awarded 1st prize at the 2019 Victorian Flute Guild Leslie Barklamb Scholarship Competition and competing as a finalist in the 2019 Australian Flute Festival Open Flute Competition. Lilly has also performed several times at the Ian Potter Centre for the ANAM@NGV concert series and collaborated alongside world-class guest artists in multiple ANAM projects. Lilly and fellow ANAM alumna, Rachel Lau, collaborated regularly as the Elara Flute Duo, and have performed live on Melbourne's 3MBS Fine Music radio (2019), the Ian Hanger Recital Hall and the Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University (QCGU) Theatre.
During her undergraduate studies in the Bachelor of Music in Performance at QCGU (2018), Lilly attained a number of outstanding achievements. These include receiving the Pat Volek Orchestral Training Scholarship, performing the Nielsen Flute Concerto as soloist with the Conservatorium String Orchestra, completing an internship with QSO and multiple performances as Principal Flute with the QCGU Symphony Orchestra. She was also selected as a performer for the Michael Cox Flute Symposium in Adelaide in 2018. Following the completion of her Bachelor’s degree, Lilly also took part in a side-by-side project of Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos with Australia’s leading chamber group, Ensemble Q.
Lilly is a passionate flute teacher and maintains an active private studio across Melbourne and Brisbane. Prior teaching engagements include tutoring flute at the Queensland College of Music and Aviation State High School in Brisbane.
Outside of playing flute, Lilly enjoys taking photos, playing tennis and trying various tea-flavoured desserts.