Winner of the Herbert von Karajan Young Conductors Award at the 2023 Salzburg Festival, Yoon was invited to make his festival debut in 2024 conducting the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien. High-profile invitations also included the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino’s offer to Yoon to return for a staged production of Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream that year.   

Yoon continues to establish himself in his native Korea, having given critically acclaimed performances with the Seoul Philharmonic, Korean National Symphony, and Hankyung arte Philharmonic, as well as with the KBS Symphony in Tokyo. Yoon made his Taiwanese debut conducting Ensemble TIMF, and this season he makes his Pohang International Festival debut.  

Other recent highlights include Mozarteumorchester Salzburg, Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, Bern Symphony Orchestra, Gstaad Festival Orchestra, Kammerorchester Basel, and the George Enescu International Festival.   

Yoon became the youngest-ever recipient of the Neeme Järvi Prize at the 2019 Gstaad Conducting Academy, and in 2021 he won both second and audience prizes at the inaugural KSO International Conducting Competition in Seoul. Yoon was a finalist at the 2020 Georg Solti Competition and 2021 Deutscher Dirigentenpreis.   

In 2021 Yoon stepped down as Second Kapellmeister of Theater und Orchester Neubrandenburg Neustrelitz.  

A prize-winning composer, Yoon made his Salzburg Festival debut premiering his own composition, and in December 2021 his work Grande Hipab was premiered by Ensemble Modern in Frankfurt. Yoon was recognized at the Luciano Berio International Composition Competition in 2020, the TONALi Festival in 2018, and other competitions. In 2019 he was one of two composers mentored by the Peter Eötvös Foundation in Budapest, where his compositions were conducted by Eötvös, and he received mentorship from George Benjamin. Yoon made his debut as conductor and composer in South Korea at the Tongyeong International Music Festival, under the artistic directorship of Unsuk Chin.   

Born in Daegu, South Korea, but calling Munich his home since 2011, Hankyeol Yoon studied conducting, composing, and piano performance at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München.