By: Liz Y.
Pasadena, CA – July 30, 2025. In a week marked by exceptional music-making and rich academic dialogue, pianist and educator Xue Zhang (Yuki Zhang) stood out not only as a performer but as a thought leader at the ICMA International Classical Music Festival held at Pepperdine University and culminating in the Closing Concert at Pasadena Steinway Gallery.
Zhang, founder of Xueyun Piano School (雪韵艺校), brought a rare dual contribution to this prestigious event. On Saturday, July 26, she delivered a featured lecture titled “The 5S Edge – How to Disrupt Traditional Music Schools and Truly Achieve Institutional Systematization”, followed by a stirring performance of Chopin’s Nocturne in C-sharp minor, No. 20, at the evening’s concert.
Her unique presence captured the very spirit of ICMA 2025: blending artistry, innovation, and vision for the future of classical music.
Xue Zhang as a Certificated Steinway & Sons Teacher & Educational Partner
A Vision Beyond Performance
In her 30-minute seminar, Zhang tackled one of the classical music world’s long-standing challenges: how to transform privately owned music schools into scalable, modern institutions without losing artistic integrity.
“The traditional model,” she explained, “relies too heavily on the founder’s personal teaching. It creates bottlenecks in growth, burnout for the owner, and an unstable learning experience for students.” Zhang’s approach, dubbed the “5S Edge”, introduces structured solutions across five key domains:
- Self-management
- Sales support
- Curriculum standardization
- Staff training
- System-level leadership tools
Drawing from her experience building a successful music education brand in China, Zhang presented a series of practical templates, operational systems, and time-management methods explicitly designed for piano school directors. Her toolkit includes resources for teacher certification, adult education curriculum, and sales-process optimization.
Her clarity and practicality resonated with the audience, which included music school owners, university educators, and advanced students preparing for careers in teaching. “We don’t just want to be better musicians,” Zhang emphasized, “we want to be better leaders—who create stable, high-quality learning environments for the next generation.”
Poetry in Motion: Her Performance
Later that afternoon, Zhang returned to the stage not as a speaker but as a soloist—delivering an emotionally nuanced and technically refined performance of Frédéric Chopin’s Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op. Posth. Her tone was delicate yet grounded, her phrasing intimate yet clear—a perfect choice for a closing concert that featured performers across all levels, from young beginners to conservatory graduates.
As one of the final performers of the evening, Zhang’s playing served as a reflective moment, balancing the energy of the earlier youth performances with a sense of maturity and depth. Audience members noted how her musical sensibility echoed her philosophy: precise, intentional, and transformative.
🌐 Representing a New Generation of Educator-Artists
Zhang’s participation in ICMA 2025 reflects a growing global trend: musicians who blur the boundaries between performance, pedagogy, and entrepreneurship. As both a concert pianist and founder of an education system serving hundreds of students, she exemplifies the multidimensional future of classical music.
Her lecture, “The 5S Edge,” has already attracted attention beyond the ICMA audience. Several attendees requested follow-up consultations, and Zhang revealed plans to release an English-language version of her system in 2026, tailored for international piano teachers seeking growth strategies.
In the words of Dr. Yaqi Wang, ICMA Vice President and organizer of the festival:
“What Xue Zhang brought to this year’s festival is incredibly rare. She doesn’t just play beautifully—she builds ecosystems. Her insights are a gift to every educator who has ever asked, ‘How can I grow without burning out?’”
ICMA 2025: A Platform for Legacy and Change
The ICMA Music Festival, held this year at Pepperdine University’s Malibu campus, combined masterclasses, lectures, and collaborative concerts. Zhang’s dual role is emblematic of the festival’s mission: to foster both the excellence of performance and the evolution of pedagogy.
From the beachside classrooms of Pepperdine to the Steinway stage in Pasadena, Zhang’s week was full of impact—and perhaps just the beginning of a broader movement in global music education.
As she said in closing:
“We teach music, but we are building futures. The better we organize ourselves, the more freedom we give to our students.”
(first row from the left: Xue Zhang, Dr. Yaqi Wang, Prof. Marian Hahn, Dr. Yuanyuan Liu, Shuimiao Zeng, Tony Lin; Second row from the left: Ke Wang, Jingyi Pan, Yaqi Jin, Dr. Mingfu Han, Bella Yan, Longcheng Ma, Beier Nie)