American Steinway Artist, Susan Merdinger has been internationally acclaimed in prestigious newspapers and journals for her stunning performances and recordings. Performing her sold-out solo piano recital debut in Carnegie Recital Hall at age twentyfour, Merdinger has continued to grace the stages of some of the world’s best concert halls, including Chicago Symphony Center, Scottish National Orchestre Center, Diligentia Hall, Merkin Concert Hall. She has appeared as piano soloist with professional orchestras such as the Chicago Philharmonic and the State Symphony Orchestra of Mexico, Northbrook Symphony, Ridgewood Symphony, Adelphi Chamber Orchestra, and has been a frequent Visiting Artist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. She has collaborated with members of the Chicago Symphony, New Jersey Symphony, Jupiter Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra, New York Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic, and renowned international soloists and conductors such as Glen Cortese, Mattia Rondelli, Gabriela Diaz Alatriste, Ilya Kaler, David Yonan, Steven Honigberg and Michaela Paetsch. Merdinger’s live performances and CD recordings have been broadcast worldwide on radio and television in the USA and Europe, traversing a broad repertoire from the 18th through 21st centuries. She has been a featured artist on WQXR’s The Listening Room, as well as WFMT’s Live from WFMT and Impromptu Series and on radio and television in Europe and Canada. Merdinger is a recipient of top awards and prizes including: The Dewar’s Young Artist Award in Music, two Gold Medals in the Global Music Awards, Artists International Young Musicians Competition and Distinguished Alumni Award, The American Prize in Chamber Music, Honored Artist of The American Prize (2019), Winner of Best Classical Album Award of the Clouzine International Music Awards, and Two First Prizes in the Bradshaw and Buono International Piano Competition (Solo and Duo Piano). Since 2012, Ms. Merdinger is a Voting Member of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (Grammy Awards), and has recorded and/or produced twelve CD albums to date. Merdinger received her formal education at Yale University, the Yale School of Music, the Manhattan School of Music and the Ecole Normale de Musique in Fontainebleau, France, studying piano with renowned “Steinway Immortals” Constance Keene, Claude Frank, Gaby Casadesus and Walter Hautzig, and conducting with Otto Werner Mueller and Robert Kapilow. Merdinger is Founder and Artistic Director of Sheridan Music Studio LLC, which presents the Music with a View Concert Series, the Blue Skies Concert Series (non-Classical), Pianissimo! - an All-Female Four Piano Ensemble, Sheridan Solisti, The Five Greene’s and she is Artistic Director and Conductor of the Sheridan Solisti Chamber Orchestra. She is currently a member of the Advisory Board of Directors and an Artistic Consultant for IN.LIVE, a startup high-tech live-streaming company for musicians based out of Silicon Valley.
As a highly sought-after teacher in the Chicago area, Ms. Merdinger’s students have been prize winners in many local, national and international competitions, have performed as soloists with orchestras and in Carnegie Hall, and have been accepted into undergraduate and graduate music programs at the most prestigious universities and music conservatories such as Harvard University, Columbia University, The Eastman School of Music, Carnegie Mellon University, Rice University, Juilliard, Manhattan School of Music, Berklee College of Music, USC Thornton School of Music and more. Many are already performing, teaching and composing music professionally.