Winnie Wong Bio 

Story-telling through the zither…..

Winnie Wong was born in Hong Kong and raised in San Francisco, CA. She started her training on the guzheng in 1982 at the age of four under the expertise of guzheng virtuoso, Ms. Weishan Liu. By the age of 5, she had her first debut. The unconditional bond between Ms. Wong, the guzheng and its culture developed immediately. From the beginning, she was surrounded, nurtured and inspired by the world of solo performance, ensemble, choral and orchestral music. Being from a Chinese immigrant family, guzheng allowed her to stay connected with her roots, but more importantly, share with the community the beauty and importance of diversity. 

Ms. Wong’s aspirations are to share and promote cultural experiences through performing arts, giving to the community and sharing with the world her love and passion for music. In her youth her performances were a part of universities and college concerts, celebrations for former mayors of San Francisco,  Asian Arts Museum grand openings, as well as grand openings of Sacramento’s federal courthouses and SF Main Library. 

In her young adulthood, she founded the “China’s Spirit Music Ensemble” to give her growing population of guzheng disciples a “home” to share and develop their skills and understanding for the guzheng, its culture as well as an outlet to share their musical achievements. 

Also in the early millennium, she ventured into the exploration of jazz and contemporary guzheng. The passion and collection of musical adventures during her first two decades in performing led for deeper exploration into the genre of “World Music” and improvisation. Asides from directing “China’s Spirit Music Ensemble”, she is also principal guzheng soloist for a world Jazz ensemble, “The Ultra World X-tet” and a member of the very uniquely fused Irish-Chinese duo “Willow Stream” alongside Irish harpist, Diana Rowan (combining improvisations with folk Irish and Chinese music as well as new arrangements).  In 2025 in partnership with Bay Area Japanese zither (koto) master, Shirley Muramoto and Korean zither (gayageum) master, Hwayoung Shon - created zither trio, Silk StringZ debuting summer of 2026.

Her four decades of musical and cultural exploration and studies has created Wong’s unique style of performance and composition. She fell in love and found excitement through “story-telling” through the strings of the zither.  Her compositions and arrangements weave together her immense imagination in imagery, textures and emotions allowing for her passion in Chinese traditional and classical music and the outside world to collide forming multi-sensory and complex experiences for her audiences.  Her creations combine the sounds of the old and new with reflections of  life’s journeys and stories from people around the world past and present. 

Her performances transcends the hearts, souls and senses of audiences into a world that surpasses one’s imagination. On March 28, 2016 "Listen for Life" presented Ms. Wong with the"Musician of the Heart" award for her performances, achievements and her dedication towards bridging cultures through music and to encourage a new generation of cultural musicians!