At the Juilliard School of Music she also participated in the master classes of Tito Gobbi, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Walter Legge, and Gérard Souzay.
In 1981, she sang professionally for the first time when composer Gian Carlo Menotti invited her to perform at the Spoleto Festival in Italy and Charleston, South Carolina, United States.
Since then, she has gradually moved into main roles such as Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro, Adina in L'elisir d'amore, and Gilda in Rigoletto.
Like many non-Italian and non-German singers, she has not been tied to operas of specific languages; her repertoire includes Italian (Verdi, Puccini, Donizetti), German (Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner) and French (Bizet, Gounod, Offenbach).
She has sung Bach with Trevor Pinnock and the Montreal Symphony, and the conductor and composer Giuseppe Sinopoli wrote his Lou Salome Suite for her, which they premiered together with the New York Philharmonic.
Hei-kyung Hong's career at the Met (updated through December 31, 2015): Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Giacomo Puccini Giuseppe Verdi Georges Bizet Richard Wagner Ludwig van Beethoven George Frideric Handel John Corigliano Jacques Offenbach Gaetano Donizetti Charles Gounod She has also appeared at the Met in four concerts and two gala performances.