The daughter of a former Secretary of South Korea's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism,[2] Kim began to play the piano around age four.
[4] Following completion of her studies in Stuttgart, Kim was the first prize winner in the 2008 Lopez Cobos International Opera Conductors Competition.
Kim made her US conducting debut in September 2017 with the Houston Grand Opera (HGO) in a production of La traviata, in the wake of Hurricane Harvey.
[3][4] Kim made her first conducting appearance with the San Francisco Opera in June 2019, in the company's production of Dvořák's Rusalka.
In December 2019, the San Francisco Opera announced the appointment of Kim as its next music director, effective August 1, 2021, with an initial contract of five years.