Described as “a prodigious composer and improviser” by Strad Magazine, 13-year-old Sylvia Pine has won First Prize in more than 40 international competitions as a composer, violinist, and singer. She has soloed with the Tel Aviv Soloists and the Syracuse Orchestra, and she has given solo performances in Carnegie Hall (New York), Musikverein (Vienna), and the Royal Albert Hall (London). She is currently the youngest member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s Young Composers Initiative and the Music Institute of Chicago’s Academy where she is a Vamos Scholarship Fellow.
Sylvia’s string quartet movement “Pull of Life” was performed in at Symphony Center in March 2025 by members of the Chicago Symphony including assistant concertmaster Yuan-Qing Yu and assistant principal cello Kenneth Olsen. Her string orchestra work “Rising Storm” will be performed in April 2025 at the Guadalajara International Music Festival in Mexico. Last season, it was performed by six youth orchestras across the U.S. She has performed her own arrangement of The Star-Spangled Banner for the Chicago Bulls and Chicago Cubs.
Sylvia will celebrate her 3,000th consecutive day of practicing on May 11. That afternoon, she will be a guest artist with the Pilgrim Chamber Players in Highland Park, IL, and she will perform a recital of duets with violinist Rachel Barton Pine on Live from WFMT on May 12.
Sylvia has attended numerous chamber music camps including the Guadalajara International Music Festival, Amherst Early Music’s Baroque Performance Academy, Credo, Heifetz, and Point CounterPoint. Trained in Alice Kanack’s Creative Ability Development method of classical improvisation, Sylvia leads weekly Improv Club gatherings for her peers. In addition to her lessons with Jessie Montgomery, she studies composition with Dr. Evan Ware and has participated in the composition programs of the Tucson Symphony and the Chicago Youth Symphony.
Sylvia is a lifelong home schooler. In addition to music, she enjoys reading, writing fiction, exploring nature, drawing, and designing original characters and species. She is vegan and loves all animals, and she is particularly passionate about rescuing hurt city pigeons and raising money and awareness for the pangolin, the most trafficked mammal on earth. sylviapine.com
