Born in Hong Kong, Perry So graduated from Yale University with a degree in comparative literature and went on to study orchestral conducting with Gustav Meier at the Johns Hopkins Peabody Institute. He was among the first Gustavo Dudamel Conducting Fellows at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and he received First and Special Prizes at the Prokofiev Conducting International Competition in St Petersburg. Among his engagements, his debut with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Houston Symphony, the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Sarasota Orchestra, the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, the Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie and Spain's RTVE Orchestra deserve special mention. He has also returned to the Symphonic Orchestra of the Principality of Asturias, Det Kongelige Teater in Copenhagen, the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra, the Sinfónica de Tenerife orchestra and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. He has collaborated abroad with other orchestral ensembles such as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, the Zürcher Kammerorchester, the Kringkastingsorkestret of Norway, the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, the Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, the Australian Youth Orchestra and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra. His debut recording includes renditions of the violin concertos of Barber and Korngold with Alexander Gilman and the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra for the German label Oehms Classics, for which he was awarded the prestigious Diapason d'Or.