Misako Mihara

Winner of the 26th Johannes Brahms International Competition in the Piano Division.
Recipient of the Grand Prize for Best Musical Performance at the 24th ABC Newcomer Concert Audition.
First Prize at the 2016 Grand Prize Virtuoso Salzburg International Music Competition.
First Prize and the Board of Directors Award from the Japan-Romania Music Society at the 12th Romanian International Music Competition.
Second Prize (highest award) and Best Performance of a Portuguese Work at the 5th Alcobaça International Chamber Music Competition.
Winner of numerous other awards, including the Top Prize at the 7th Sengawa Piano Audition.

Her repertoire spans from Baroque to contemporary works, with a particular focus on the works of Brahms, which she studies daily to deepen her musical expression.

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She is actively engaged as a soloist and chamber musician, and has performed with orchestras both in Japan and abroad, including the Euro Symphony SFK Orchestra, Kansai Philharmonic Orchestra, Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra, Japan Century Symphony Orchestra, Gunma Symphony Orchestra, Yamagata Symphony Orchestra, and Tokyo New City Orchestra (now Pacific Philharmonia Tokyo).

In 2025, she will appear in the concert “The Music of Nodame Cantabile – Live!”, and will launch the “Dear Brahms” concert series, dedicated to Brahms’s piano chamber music.

Her two CDs, “Brahms Neue Bahnen” and “CONTRAST”, have been highly acclaimed in music journals. One review praised her: “Her strong fingertips express with remarkable clarity the delicate nuances the composer imbued in every note.”

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She graduated from the Toho Gakuen School of Music and its graduate program, and later completed her studies with top honors at the Berlin University of the Arts.
As a recipient of the 2017 Japanese Government Overseas Study Program for Artists by the Agency for Cultural Affairs, she also completed graduate studies at the Mozarteum University Salzburg.

Her principal teachers include Jacques Rouvier, Zlata Chochieva, Hiroko Ninomiya, Izumi Komoriya, Yumiko Doi, and Mitsuyo Yamamoto.

She is currently a part-time lecturer at Toho Gakuen School of Music and its affiliated Music Classes for Children (Sengawa and Ochanomizu branches).

Recipient of the 2019 Fujisawa City Special Contribution Award for Lifelong Learning.
She is a registered artist for the 2025–2026 fiscal year with the Japan Foundation for Regional Art-Activities' Public Hall Music Revitalization Project.