Praised for her energetic playing as well as for her sensitive interpretations German/Japanese pianist Mariko Sudo has made appearances at renowned music festivals throughout Europe such as the Klavierfestival Ruhr, International Summeracademy Salzburg, Euriade, Muziek Biennale Niederrhein as well as the Sarasota Music Festival in Florida (US). In 2011 she made her New York debut at Carnegie Hall (Weill Recital Hall). As an active performer she was invited as a soloist by orchestras like the Duisburg Philharmonic and several chamber orchestras led by conductors as Jonathan Darlington, Uriel Segal, Ian Fountain, Eckhard Fischer, Gus Anton and Joachim Neugart. In 2010 she was awarded Solosist in Residence by the Neuss Chamber Orchestra. Concert tours led her to the USA and throughout Europe.
Having received national and international prizes Mariko Sudo was awarded the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Prize and the Chamber Music Prize of the “Freunde junger Musiker e. V.” in Berlin with her piano quartet, the Orion Piano Quartet. She had the opportunity to work with many famous artists such as Claude Frank, Vitaly Margulis, Paul Badura Skoda, Susan Starr, Jura Margulis, Angela Cheng, Asaf Zohar and Dirk Mommertz. Especially her continuous work with Robert Levin, who became one of her most important mentors, took an important influence on her musical development.
Awarded with a prestigious DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) scholarship she studied with the legendary Menahem Pressler at the renowned Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, Indiana (US), where she received a Master’s degree in piano performance from the Indiana University in 2013. In 2009 she completed her studies with Arnulf von Arnim at the Folkwang University of Arts in Essen/Germany with an artistic diploma. Until 2003 Mariko was a student of Leontina Margulis in Cologne and at the Anton-Rubinstein-Academy Düsseldorf.