[3] Born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Lauren Zhang started to play the piano under Madeline Ignazito when she was four years old, and the violin under Terry Coulton at the age of six in Illinois.
In 2010, when their family moved to England,[4] Lauren Zhang joined the Junior Department at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and initially studied piano with Rebeca Omordia.
In addition, Lauren Zhang has received advice and participated in masterclasses with Kenneth Hamilton, Lan Mi, Fabio Bidini, Peter Donohoe, Kalman Drafi, Philip Martin, Pascal Nemirovski, Menahem Pressler and John Thwaites.
[2] At the final of the Young Musician competition, Zhang played Prokofiev's Second Piano Concerto, accompanied by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mark Wigglesworth.
[2] The winner of the 2004 competition, and 2018 BBC Young Musician Ambassador, the violinist Nicola Benedetti,[5] noted her "natural genuine musicianship" while Julian Lloyd Webber, head of Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, said: "Having spent a lifetime making music with some of the world’s finest musicians, I can honestly say that Lauren is up there with the best—she is a total phenomenon.