Himari appears in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's subscription concert in February. (©Todd Rosenberg, courtesy of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra)
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Fourteen-year-old violinist Himari is making her mark on the world's greatest stages. In March 2025, she performed in the Berlin Philharmonic's regular concert series, and in February, she made her solo debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, one of the world's leading ensembles. She is already scheduled to make her Carnegie Hall debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 2027.
For Himari, music is inseparable from joy. In an email interview with The Sankei Shimbun, she said she looks forward to "creating music together with the musicians I will meet in the future."
From February 12 to 15, Himari performed Max Bruch's Violin Concerto No 1 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Jaap van Zweden. As the concert progressed, a growing rapport with the orchestra gave her performance a rich, brilliant quality that held the audience rapt.
Chicago's local outlet WTTW praised her performance, writing that her "beautiful, warm, and emotionally rich solo playing was a constant presence throughout, with her dramatic sensibility shining through. In another solo passage too, Himari's performance was simply astonishing."
Himari is now among the most talked-about violinists in the world. Since making her Berlin Philharmonic debut at 13 in March 2025, she has gone on to perform with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, among others.
More Than a Promising Young Talent
What makes this particularly striking is that in each of these cities, Berlin, Chicago, London, Switzerland, and Pittsburgh, she has been invited as a soloist for subscription concerts. These are each orchestra's most important performances, the ones that define their artistic identity and reputation. She is not being celebrated as a precocious young talent, but welcomed as a violinist these orchestras genuinely want to perform with.
Looking back on the past year, Himari reflected warmly. "I've been fortunate to have many opportunities to perform overseas. Traveling so much can be difficult at times, but it's also a nice change of pace."
She added, "Berlin was particularly memorable. There were various unexpected happenings, and the piece I played, Wieniawski's Violin Concerto No 1, is very challenging. But wherever I go, the act of creating music doesn't change, so I'm enjoying it."
On her Chicago debut, she was equally reflective. "It was a meaningful collaboration for me. Of course the orchestra's sound and Maestro Jaap were wonderful, but one of my classmates from Curtis, who I had studied with for a long time, was performing there as well."
Seated in the front row of the second violin section was Danny Yehun Jin, a fellow student from the prestigious Curtis Institute of Music. In the audience sat her Curtis teacher, the renowned violinist Ida Kavafian. On the final night of the run, the two former classmates performed together for the encore.
"Our teacher was listening in the hall," Himari said with a laugh. "It became a debut I'll always remember."
Himari was born in Tokyo and began playing the violin at three. By six she was performing with a professional orchestra, and she has been attracting attention ever since. In 2022, she was admitted to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia as its youngest ever student, moving to the United States at the age of ten. She continues to study there under Kavafian to this day.
Student and Soloist
Himari hasn't let her performance career come at the expense of her development as a student. The week after her Chicago Symphony debut, she was back on campus for a student concert. Continuing to learn and grow while performing on the world's greatest stages is, perhaps, one of her greatest strengths.
This year brings a packed schedule. Himari will make her subscription concert debut with the NHK Symphony Orchestra, and appear at the Colorado, Vail, and Tanglewood music festivals over the summer.
In the autumn she will tour Japan with the London Symphony Orchestra and perform with the St Louis Symphony Orchestra. Then in April 2027 comes her Carnegie Hall debut, appearing with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in its subscription concert series at one of the most storied venues in American music.
Making People Smile
"This year I have the NHK Symphony Orchestra subscription concerts in Japan in June, and my debut at several music festivals in the summer," she said. "I'm happy to work on new pieces and to create music together with the musicians I will meet in the future. I want to share the delicate, voice-like tone of the violin with as many people as possible."
In a previous interview she said, "Concerts are something you play for people. I want to cherish every one of them. Seeing the audience with happy faces — that's what I love most." For Himari, every performance is as much about the people in the hall as the music on the page.
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Author: Naomi Yasuda, The Sankei Shimbun
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