Dr. CHEN YI*, composer (born in 1953, Guangzhou, China):

As a prolific composer and the recipient of the Charles Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (2001-2004), Dr. CHEN Yi* blends Chinese and Western traditions, transcending cultural and musical boundaries. Her music has reached wide range of audiences and inspired peoples with different cultural background throughout the world. She holds BA and MA degrees in music composition from the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing (’83 and ‘86), and DMA degree from Columbia University in the City of New York (’93), studying composition with Profs. Wu Zuqiang, Chou Wen-chung and Mario Davidovsky. She has been Distinguished Professor in Music at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music since 1998. She has been inducted to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2005, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2019.

 Published by Theodore Presser Company, Dr. Chen's music has been commissioned and performed world wide by such ensembles as the Cleveland Orchestra, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the BBC Symphony and the BBC/Royal philharmonics, the Seattle, Pacific, SF, National, NJ, Toronto, Singapore, New Zealand, China National symphonies, the Brooklyn, the NY, the LA philharmonics, the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra and Sachsische Staatskapelle Dresden, The Women’s Philharmonic and Chanticleer (supported by Meet The Composer New Residences), Music From China, Racher/Prism Saxophone Quartet, Shanghai/Ying String Quartet, by soloists Yo-Yo Ma, Yehudi Menuhin, Evelyn Glennie, Michala Petri, Cho-Liang Lin, Emanuel Ax, Wu Man, and conductors JoAnn Falletta, Dennis Russell Davies, Lan Shui, Leonard Slatkin, Franz Welser-Möst, Gerard Schwartz, among others. Her music has been recorded on Bis, New Albion, Teldec (w/ Grammy Award for Colors of Love in 1999), New World (w/ NPR Top 10 Classical Music Album Award for Sound of the Five in 2009), Albany, Bridge, Naxos (w/ Grammy Award Nomination for Symphony Humen 1839 in 2015), China Record Co., and many more. Dr. Chen Yi was the first woman to receive a master’s degree in composition from the Central Conservatory in China when she gave an evening concert of her orchestral works in Beijing, performed by the Central Philharmonic of China in June 1986. She has given two more whole evening concerts of her orchestral and choral works in Beijing, presented by the China National Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in 2001 and 2008 respectively. She is also the first woman to give an evening of multimedia concert of her orchestral and choral music in the US as the culmination of her 3-year residency in San Francisco with The Women's Philharmonic and Chanticleer in May 1996, supported by Meet The Composer. 

 Besides the Charles Ives Living Award for composer, Dr. Chen has also received fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Lieberson Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Commissioning awards were received from the Fromm Foundation at Harvard University, the Koussevitzky Music Foundation at the Library of Congress, the Roche Foundation/Lucerne Festival, Carnegie Hall, Chamber Music America, Meet The Composer, American Composers Forum, Barlow Endowment for Music Composition, the American Guild of Organists, American Choral Directors Association, and the China National Center for Performing Arts, among many more. Other honors include the first prize from the Chinese National Composition Contest (1985 for chamber work and 2012 for symphonic work), Lili Boulanger Award (1993), NYU Sorel Medal Award (1996), CalArts / Alpert Award (1997), UT Eddie Medora King Composition Prize (1999), ASCAP Concert Music Award (2001), Elise Stoeger Award (2002) from Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Friendship Ambassador Award from Edgar Snow Fund (2002), UMKC Kauffman Award in Artistry/Scholarship (2006 and 2019) and in Faculty Service (2012), as well as Pulitzer Prize Finalist with Si Ji (Four Seasons) for orchestra (2006). She has also received Honorary Doctorates from Lawrence University in WI (2002), Baldwin-Wallace College in OH (2008), University of Portland in OR (2009), The New School University in NYC (2010), and the University of Hartford in CT (2016). 

Dr. Chen Yi is a strong advocate of new music, contemporary composers, and women in music. She has served on the advisory or educational board of the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Chamber Music America, Meet The Composer, the American Music Center, New Music USA, the American Composers Orchestra, the League of Composers/ISCM, the International Alliance of Women in Music, and the Women’s Philharmonic Advocacy. She has supported many composers, conductors, musicians (including dozens of excellent performers on Chinese traditional instruments), music educators and students through her tireless work in the past three decades.

 Prof. Chen has served as Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Central Conservatory in Beijing (2006-2011) where she was instrumental in establishing the first Beijing International Composition Workshop. She has also served as Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Tianjin Conservatory (2012-2017). Through her professorship in the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory since 1998 and Peabody Conservatory, John Hopkins University (1996-1998), as well as her activities in giving composition lectures and workshops, judging composition competitions, residences in new music festivals, working with performing arts organizations, universities, colleges, middle/high schools, and primary schools throughout the States and China, Prof. Chen has made significant contribution to the music education field. Many of her composition students have won recognition around the world, with national and international composition awards and professional positions.

 Dr. Chen Yi is a cultural ambassador who has introduced hundreds of new music compositions and a large number of musicians from the East and the West to music and education exchange programs in the US, Germany, the UK, and Asian countries, particularly in recent years through programs of the Beijing Modern Music Festival, the Beijing International Composition Workshop (BICW), the Shanghai Spring Festival, the Tianjin May Festival, the China-ASEAN Music Week, the symphony orchestras throughout China and some other Asian countries, and the Thailand International Composition Festival, among many others. She believes that music is a universal language; to improve the understandings between peoples from different cultural backgrounds through music could help to bring peace to the world.  <https://www.presser.com/chen-yi>

* Chen is family name; Yi is personal name. Chen Yi can be referred to Dr. Chen, Prof. Chen, Ms. Chen, or Chen Yi, but not Dr. Yi, Prof. Yi, or Ms. Yi.