Alvin Zhu has performed Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Gershwin, and Rachmaninoff concertos with orchestras around the world, appearing at Alice Tully Hall, Steinway Hall, Sydney Opera House, Beijing Concert Hall, Forbidden City Concert Hall, Tianjin Grand Theater, Palais du Congress, Stadio Olimpico, David Lawrence Convention Center, Paul and Morse Halls at Juilliard, the Amphitheater in Chautauqua, Sprague Hall at Yale University, and Joan and Irving Harris Hall in Aspen. He has recorded for NPR’s ‘From the Top’ as a featured Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist, Pittsburgh’s WQED radio, and Steinway’s Spirio player-piano catalog, and recently appeared on Beijing Youth Radio.  In 2009, he was the first American pianist to be part of the Young Steinway Artists roster. He holds several prizes in international and national competitions. As juror, he has been on the panel of the 2020 Paris Vivace International, 2020 Singapore International, 2019 Franz Liszt Youth International, 2019 GOCAA International, and the 2018 Steinway International piano competitions. As of 2020, he currently holds an honorary position as Overseas Artistic Consultant for both the Global Outstanding Chinese Artists Association (GOCAA) and the Suzhou Qiaolian Arts Ensemble.

A pupil of Jeffrey Milarsky, he has conducted the Juilliard Lab Orchestra, and is guest conductor with the Pittsburgh Haihua Youth Orchestra. He has given master classes at Yale, Texas State, Brigham Young, and Weber State Universities, Open College-Conservatory, Liu Shikun Arts School, Li Delun Foundation, Steinway Gallery of Toronto, Steinway Beijing and Shanghai, Faber Institute, and the Young Artists Program of the Steinway Society of Western Pennsylvania, and has been a teaching artist at Yale University School of Music. At Juilliard, Zhu is a former teaching fellow for graduate music history and undergraduate music theory. He is a recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship and has researched the musical contributions of his paternal grandfather Gong Yi Zhu, a master piano pedagogue whose influence in China is still widely felt today. He has been a guest lecturer at the United States Embassy in Beijing, The Juilliard School in New York, Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, and Soochow University in Taiwan.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Zhu produced a musical tribute entitled ‘Project Mompou’ for healthcare and essential workers around the world. The video project features Zhu and five of his Tianjin Juilliard Pre-College students performing Spanish composer Federico Mompou’s poignant ‘Impresiones Íntimas.’

Zhu started piano and violin lessons at age four. Zhu holds a BM and MM from Juilliard, and having been awarded a C.V. Starr Foundation Doctoral Fellowship there, returned to pursue a DMA in piano performance at Juilliard under the tutelage of Yoheved Kaplinsky and Julian Martin.