Raeun Hong

Raeun Hong was born into a musical family in Seoul, South Korea in 2009. She started studying the piano and violin at the age of five and the oboe at the age of eight. At the age of ten, she was accepted into the Korean National Institute as the youngest ever woodwind player. In 2020, the school named her its “excellent young artist of the year” and at the age of eleven she undertook her first solo recital at the Elim Art Center. She has received a number of awards over the last three years, including the first prize and music director’s prize at an international music competition in Barletta, Italy, the main prize at an international music competition in Vienna (2023) and several first prizes in Korea, Denmark and Latvia. In 2023, Seoul’s Kumho Music Foundation named her its “young musician” and as such she performed a recital at the Kumho Art Hall in March 2024, which met with positive acclaim. Last year, she also became the youngest oboist to make it to the second round of the 59^th annual international oboe competition in Markneukirchen, Germany.