Goh Jia Yun is a 17-year old teenager with Down Syndrome. She was enrolled into Beautiful Mind Music Academy, the music unit of Beautiful Mind Charity, in January 2016 as one of our beneficiaries to receive free piano lessons. Prior to this she was receiving private piano lessons since year 2010.

 

As a student of BMMA, Jia Yun has been receiving one-on-one piano lessons from our volunteer music teacher Ms Bae Min Hee, and more recently Ms Park Ji Sung when Ms Bae relocated overseas.

 

A small-built teenager, Jia Yun has a friendly and unpretentious demeanor that is both captivating and likeable.  Though she has difficulty in expressing herself well enough to be fully understood, she enjoys good relationship with her parents and two elder brothers who are very supportive of her, especially in her pursuit of music.

 

In Jia Yun’s self-introduction, she shared that classical music has a soothing effect on her, and this has led to her keen interest in music.

 

In the words of Jia Yun’s family - “In these few months since Jia Yun joined BMMA, she has learned much, as the teachers in BMMA are experienced, are full of love and kindness, and even gave her the opportunity to perform on stage. All the progress and improvements can be seen in the way Jia Yun plays the piano. We are very proud of her and are thankful for everything that BMMA has done for her”.

 

Jia Yun’s teacher initially found her to be rather shy and only play the piano with comfort and ease when her mother was around. However, after interacting and getting to know each other better through the lessons, Jia Yun is doing fine on her own. She practices as diligently, if not more, than any other student. Teacher Ji Sung is gratified and delighted to see Jia Yun deriving much happiness and joy in playing the piano.

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Jia Yun made her debut piano performance with two solo pieces at BMMA’s 30th April 2016 concert at School of the Arts (SOTA). She also performed at BMMA’s progress concert on 26th November 2016.

 

We are elated to learn that Jia Yun had passed the Trinity College London Grade 1 piano examination in June 2016 with good results. Her achievement is commendable and we wish her more successes in her future attempts at higher level piano examinations.

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