Chen grew up in Oak Park, California,[1] and received private piano instruction from Edward Francis.
[2] Chen was accepted into the Juilliard School, and received both his Bachelor and Master of Music degrees there, studying with Jerome Lowenthal and Matti Raekallio.
[8] While a graduate student at Juilliard, Chen also received the prestigious Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans in 2010.
Throughout his performances, Chen has played with orchestras such as the Fort Worth, Indianapolis, Kansas City, San Diego, Knoxville, Hartford, Louisiana Philharmonic, Milwaukee, North Carolina, Pasadena, Phoenix, Santa Fe, and New West Symphony Orchestras, as well as the Chamber Orchestras of Philadelphia, Indianapolis, and South Bay, collaborating with such esteemed conductors as Leonard Slatkin, Michael Stern, Gerard Schwarz, Nicholas McGegan, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, Marcelo Lehninger, and James Judd.
His concert arrangements for piano include Overture to the Marriage of Figaro, the slow movement from Rachmaninoff Symphony No.