Born in Osaka, Japan, Sae Yamashita began studying piano at the age of five. She 
graduated at the top of her class from Kyoto Horikawa Music High School as a scholarship student of the Kyoichi Saikyo Alumni Association. She earned both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the Tokyo University of the Arts, where she studied under Susumu Aoyagi as a scholarship student of the Fukushima Foundation. She also studied chamber music and fortepiano. 
 
She received a short-term study abroad scholarship to study in the United States, where she studied with Sara Davis Buechner in 2023. She is currently supported by the Munetsugu Angel Fund / Japan Federation of Musicians Emerging Performers Domestic Scholarship, through which she is building her career as a pianist. 
 
She has won prizes at numerous competitions, including the Steinway Competition in Japan (1st Prize), the Japan Classical Music Competition (Top Prize), and the Student Music Competition of Japan, Osaka Division (2nd Prize). She was awarded the Kameoka Mayor’s Prize and the Kyoto Governor’s Prize at the Kyoto Art Festival in 2025. 
 
She has also given numerous recitals in Kyoto, Osaka, Kanagawa, and Tokyo, and has performed as soloist with orchestra, including Schumann’s Piano Concerto and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4. She gave a concert with violist Vladímir Bukač this May. She will give a recital in Tokyo, and perform Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with the Kyoto New Festival Orchestra in 2026.