One of the most exciting Chinese conductors on today’s classical music scene, Huang Yi is currently Music Director of the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra (GSO), Principal Conductor of the China Philharmonic Orchestra and Conductor Laureate of the Kunming Nie Er Symphony Orchestra.

Huang Yi has been Music Director of the GSO since the 2023/2024 season, his first collaboration with orchestra dating back to 2012, with dozens of memorable concerts featuring works by Mahler, Beethoven, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky, Bernstein, Ding Shande, Qigang Chen, Tan Dun and others. He has also conducted the Guangzhou New Year Concerts for four consecutive years (2023‒2026). His tremendous creative rapport with the orchestra is not only appreciated by GSO musicians but also highly acclaimed by the public. In 2025, at the 255th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven, Huang completed a full Beethoven cycle at the Xinghai Concert Hall featuring all nine symphonies, five piano concertos, the violin concerto, the triple concerto, four overtures and the Choral Fantasy in nine concerts with leading instrumental and vocal soloists.

Huang’s career began in 2009 as Maestro Seiji Ozawa’s assistant conductor. In 2012, recommended by Maestro Long Yu, Huang made his opera debut conducting the China Philharmonic Orchestra at the Beijing Music Festival’s new production of Jin Xiang’s Savage Land. In 2013, as assistant conductor to Christian Thielemann, Huang participated in the production of Parsifal at the Salzburg Easter Festival and later the same year assisted Gustav Kuhn in the same production at the Beijing Music Festival. In 2015, he conducted the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra for the world premiere of Ricochet in the closing concert of the Music in the Summer Air (MISA) festival. From 2019 to 2024, Huang Yi was invited to conduct New Year concerts successively by the China Philharmonic, Shanghai Symphony and Guangzhou Symphony. In July 2023, he conducted the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra again for the closing concert of MISA.

Huang Yi joined the China Philharmonic Orchestra in 2015 first as Assistant Conductor, then as Principal Conductor in 2021. Also in 2015, he was invited to be Assistant Professor at Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin. From 2016 to 2025, he served as Artistic Director and Chief Conductor of Kunming Nie Er Symphony Orchestra. In 2023, he was appointed as the Music Director of Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, effective from the 2023/2024 season, succeeding Maestro Long Yu.

Most recently, Huang Yi conducted such international ensembles as the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Frankfurt Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa Ongaku-Juku Symphony Orchestra and Busan Philharmonic Orchestra of Korea. He has also performed with the leading orchestras in China, including the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra, Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra, China NCPA Orchestra, Guiyang Symphony Orchestra, Macao Orchestra, Ningbo Symphony Orchestra, Chengdu Symphony Orchestra and Inner Mongolia Arts Theatre Orchestra, China National Symphony Orchestra, etc. He has collaborated with numerous artists, including Leonidas Kavakos, Augustin Hadelich, Gautier Capuçon, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Stephen Hough, Julian Rachlin, Augustin Dumay, Matthias Goerne and Gerhard Oppitz, as well as nearly all of China’s distinguished instrumentalists and vocalists.

Huang Yi was born in 1986 into a family of musicians in Beijing. From his early childhood he was trained by his father Huang He, a renowned music professor. Later, he studied at the Central Conservatory of Music with Yang Li and Yu Feng. In 2011, he continued his studies at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler” Berlin with Christian Ehwald and Hans-Dieter Baum.