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Blakelock's Ji Soo Choi headed to Juilliard to study violin by Dominik Kurek Oakville Beaver Staff Artscene 23 | Wednesday, May 1, 2013 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insideHALTON.com "Connected to your Community" Oakville's Ji Soo Choi clearly has music in her veins. The young violinist is headed to Juilliard School in New York City where she will work on her bachelor's degree in violin this coming school year. "I'm really excited. It's something that also my mom dreamed of and is something that I really wanted to do. Juilliard is such a big name," Choi said. The 18-year-old T.A. Blakelock High School student has been playing violin since the age of three. She takes lessons through the Royal Conservatory of Music (RCM) and practices a minimum of six hour a day, this on top of the time she spends in music class at Blakelock. She's also the concertmaster for the Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra. But she didn't always like the instrument. Her mom bought her a violin for her third birthday, but Choi had no immediate interest in playing it. "I looked at it and I decided to play with it. While my mom was gone cooking, I actually took the violin apart and then I fell asleep. Then my mom came back, `Oh, you're sleeping, you're so cute.' Then she looked at the violin and got so mad. That's how I started it," she said with a laugh. The violin had to be replaced. Choi didn't actually begin to enjoy the instrument until she came to Canada when she was 10 years old. "I wanted to give up violin, completely," she said. "It's so stressful at a young age in Korea. It was very intense. Now, I came to Canada and started at RCM and it was really relaxing. I got to do a chamber music orchestra, master classes, those are the things that I didn't do when I was in Korea. It was something new and I really enjoyed it." Choi hopes to pursue a career as a music teacher, either as a university professor or to conduct master classes. Blakelock music teacher Brian Vincent, who heads the school's arts and science departments, said Choi has already started teaching. Oakville's Ji Soo Choi is headed to New York City in September to study violin at the prestigious Juilliard School. photo by Nikki Wesley ­ Oakville Beaver (Follow on Twitter @halton_photog) "Ji Soo didn't have to choose to be part of our music program and yet she did and that seriously affected and inspired her peers to do really cool things," Vincent said. This graduating year, Vincent has students heading into music programs at the University of Toronto, Laurier University, University of Western Ontario and York University. One student received a full scholarship for her undergraduate in vocals at U of T. "Having someone like Ji Soo grow up with them and for them to see that kind of excellence, I know has been an inspiration for other kids who want to do cool things in the music," Vincent said. The school's Grade 12 music class recently participated at a provincial chamber music festival with performances by a percussion ensemble, a woodwind quartet and a violin string trio (on which Choi is a member). The percussion and violin groups won gold medals each and have been invited to nationals. The quartet won a silver medal. Part of the reason for such success, Vincent said, is Choi, whom he calls a quiet leader who is just an excellent musician all the time. "We're really lucky that Ji Soo's parents like living in this neighbourhood. Getting to know Ji Soo over the last couple of years has been really cool," Vincent said. He added Choi doesn't need much teaching. Instead, she is given support, such as when the music class travelled to Toronto to see Ji Soo perform a solo at a Toronto Symphony concerto. Vincent said the reason Choi is such a strong player is because she's absolutely committed to the art form and has passion for it. He's also excited for all his students heading into music programs next year, saying students who study music in university go onto many successes in life. "Doing an undergraduate in music is not really about a career in music," he said. "Doing an undergraduate in music is about being a person who is creative and thoughtful and analytical. People who graduate from undergraduate programs go on to, specifically in this order, education, law, business, medicine and then careers in performance." Dominik Kurek can be reached at dkurek@ oakvillebeaver.com or followed on Twitter at @ DominikKurek.