Hideaki Shiotsu’s passion for music started when he heard his brother and his friends play chamber music.  When he was eight years old, he was intrigued with the viola but it was too big of an instrument for him so he started his musical career with a violin. In two years he had grown enough that he switched to his beloved viola. His teacher Dr. Madeline Woodward taught him both violin and viola in his early years. He studied with Dr. Leslie Johnson for eight years. He now studies under the tutelage of Masumi Per Rostad at the Eastman School of Music where he received a Dean’s Performance Award scholarship. 

Hideaki has been a prizewinner in competitions such as Seattle Youth Symphony’s Concerto Competition, the Concerto and Solo divisions of the Performing Arts Festival of the Eastside, the runner up for Eastman’s Walton Viola Concerto competition, and has participated as a finalist at the 2025 Frances Walton Competition hosted by the Seattle Ladies Musical Club. Hideaki has also had the privilege of attending summer festivals such as the Heifetz International Music Institute, Bowdoin International, Music@Menlo YAP, Sarasota Music, Colorado College Music, and Pacific Music Festivals. He is also looking forward to attending the New York String Orchestra Seminar this December. An avid chamber musician, Hideaki has performed chamber music alongside esteemed artists such as Yura Lee and Benjamin Beilman and has been coached by Leonid Keylin, Nathan Chan, and the Ying Quartet. As a soloist, Hideaki has also had the privilege of performing with the Seattle Youth Chamber Orchestra at Benaroya Hall and with the Mercer Island Chamber Orchestra at the Mercer Island High School Performing Arts Center. 

Hideaki has performed in masterclasses given by Melia Watras, Maria Larionoff, Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt, Matthew Lipman, Paul Neubauer, Teng Li, Yura Lee, Arnaud Sussmann, David Requiro, and the Borromeo String Quartet.