Hayes School of Music

Dr. Mi-Jin Kim is a staff pianist in the Hayes School of Music at Appalachian State University. Dr. Kim has held full-time faculty positions at Oklahoma State University, Arkansas Tech University, and Arkansas State University. Dr. Kim joined Appalachian State University in the Fall of 2023. 

Dr. Kim started taking piano lessons at age of six, in her native Incheon, Republic of Korea. Her significant talent received recognition and awards from numerous competitions such as the Joong-Ahng Music Newspaper Competition and the Incheon City Piano Competition in Korea, the International Piano Workshop Competition in Bulgaria, the International Bicentennial Liszt Competition in Los Angeles, among others. She has appeared as soloist with the Sejong University Symphony Orchestra and Good Classic Music Festival Orchestra in Korea, and with the Philharmonica Bulgarica in Bulgaria. In 2015, she was also invited to perform at the 2015 American Liszt Society Festival "Liszt and Damnation," held at the University of North Texas.

During the past decade, Dr. Kim  has served as a collaborative pianist and coach at numerous concerts and festivals, including Opera Theatre and Music Festival of Lucca and Centro Studi Carlo della Giacoma Master Class for Clarinet and Piano in Italy, Tarrant County College, Oklahoma State University, University of Texas at Arlington, and University of North Texas, Denton campus. Her collaborative performances have also been live-broadcasted by the WRR 101.1 "Classic Cafe" at the Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas. Dr. Kim has also had the opportunity to perform and coach during the summers of 2021 and 2022 at Opera in the Ozarks at Inspiration Point. 

Dr. Kim holds a Doctoral of Musical Arts degree in Piano Performance from the University of North Texas and earned a double master’s degree in piano performance and collaborative piano from Michigan State University.