Tomonari Tsuchiya, born in Tokyo in 1987, began his piano studies at the age of six with Vicky Goon Menliew and later with Shane Thio from Singapore Symphony Orchestra. Soon after he entered Royal Irish Academy of Music in Dublin at the age of fourteen with a full scholarship, he started to win prizes at both national and international competitions and gave his first recital in front of the Irish President at her residence and Russian Federation Embassy in Limerick.
He currently holds fourteen prizes including the 3rd prize International Piano Competition Named after S.V. Rachmaninov in Veliky Novgorod, Russia and 2nd prize Kawai Asia International Piano Competition in Hong Kong.
Since then, he has been actively giving recitals in London, several places in Malaysia including Kuala Lumpur, Penang and Malacca, various places in Osaka, Kobe, Tokyo, Singapore and Guongdong, China where he judged for the International Arts Festival as well.
Tomonari was under some of the most renowned pianists and professors in Europe such as Pavel Nersessian, Pascal Roge, Edmond Battersby, Andrei Pisarev, Christopher Elton, Stefania Passamonte, Emanuel Krasovsky, Boris Berman and his eminent professor, Benjamin Kaplan. They have been a big influence in his development as a concert pianist.
In 2005, Tomonari graduated from the Royal Irish Academy with honours where he studied with Professor Deirdre Doyle. He continued his studies in France with Russian Pianist, Roustem Saitkoulov and also at Ecole Normale de Music in Paris with Prof. France Clidat where he was awarded 3rd prize Hubert de Luze Loris Talmart.
He then further extended his studies at Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Martin Roscoe, Noriko Ogawa and Peter Bithell where he graduated with honours in Master of Performance.
After having taught at UiTM in Malaysia where he used to live among several countries, he continues to give solo recitals, lectures, master classes as well as chamber concerts in collaboration with other musicians. In recent years, he moved to Japan and gave his solo debut in his home country followed by Brahms Concerto No.2 with the members of Ensemble Kobe, a growing orchestra in west Japan. He was also a former committee member of OSAKA International Music Competition who looked after the Malaysia Regional Round. In 2018, he has founded “Glamorous Duo” with a renowned cellist, Ms. Yoshiko Ikemura and released a first CD of Rachmaninov and Shostakovich Cello Sonata under the label of Rapt Sound.