Diehn Composers Room Contemporary Music Research Collection

BIOGRAPHY

A native of Guangzhou, China, Chen Yi was born April 4, 1953 into a family of doctors with a strong interest in music. She began violin and piano studies with Zheng Ri-hua and Lee Soo Sin at the age of three. When the Cultural revolution overtook China in the 1960's, she tried hard to continue her music studies, practicing violin at home (with the mute attached). She was sent for forced labor into the countryside for two years and took her instrument along. A positive aspect of this experience was the knowledge she gained of the wider life and music of her motherland and its people.

When she was 17, she returned to her home city and served as concertmaster and composer with the Beijing Opera Troupe. She began, at this time, her research of Chinese traditional music and Western classical music theory under the supervision of Zheng Zhong. When the school system was restored in 1977, Chen enrolled in the Beijing Central Conservatory, where she studied composition under Professor Wu Zu-qiang and British guest composer Alexander Goehr.¾ She continued her violin studies with Professor Lin Yao-ji and began an eight-year systematic study of Chinese traditional music. In 1983, Ms. Chen composed the first Chinese viola concerto (Xian Shi) and, in 1986, the Chinese Musicians Association, the Central Conservatory of Music, Radio Beijing, CCTV and the Central Philharmonic of China jointly gave, in Beijing, an entire program devoted to Chen's orchestral works, when she became the first woman in China to receive the degree of Master of Arts in composition. In 1986, Chen Yi went to the United States for further musical studies.

In 1993, she received her Doctor of Musical Arts, with distinction, from Columbia University, where she studied under Chou Wen-chung and Mario Davidovsky. In the same year, Dr. Chen was appointed, through the Meet the Composer New Residencies program, to a three year term as Composer-in-Residence for the Women's Philharmonic, Chanticleer and the Aptos Creative Arts Program, all in San Francisco. In June of 1996, Chen had three sold-out gala concerts at the Center for the Arts Theater, Yerba Buena Gardens, SF, with her orchestral works Ge Xu and Symphony No.2, choral works Set Of Chinese Folk Songs and Tang Poems, and the multi-media Chinese Myths Cantata, presented by the WP, Chanticleer and Lili Cai Dance Company, and received critical acclaims. She then joined the composition faculty of Peabody Conservatory, Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (1996-1998).¾ She is the Cravens/Millsap/Missouri Distinguished Professor in Composition at the UMKC Conservatory starting in 1998.

As the recipient of the prestigious Ives Living Award (2001-2004) from the American Academy of Arts and Letter, and the ASCAP 2001 Concert Music Award, Chen Yi has received numerous awards and prizes including first prize from the Chinese National Composition Competition (Duo Ye for solo piano), the Lili Boulanger Award, the 1996 Sorel Medal for Excellence in Music from the Center for Women in Music at New York University, the 1997 CalArts Alpert Award for music and the first Eddie Medora King Composition Prize from the University of Texas at Austin School of Music, the Elise Stoeger Award (02) from Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Friendship Ambassador Award from Edgar Snow Fund (02), Honorary Doctorate from Lawrence University, WI (02), and the Adventurous Programming Award from ASCAP (for Music From China). She has also received prestigious fellowships from the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, the Koussevitzky Foundation, the Creative Work Fund, the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, The Roche Foundation, the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, the Eastman School of Music, the Copland Fund for Music, Chamber Music America, the San Francisco Art Commission, the NYSCA, and the Meet the Composer/Reader's Digest Consortium Commissioning program in the States. Her music is published by Theodore Presser Company and recorded on New Albion ('97), Bis ('02, '03, '04), Albany ('04), CRI ('99), Teldec ('97, '99 with Grammy Award), Nimbus ('93, '00), Cala ('95), Avant ('98), Atma ('99), Hugo ('00), Angel ('01), Delos ('04), Centaur ('04), Koch International Classics ('04), and China Record Corporation ('86, '90).

In her compositions, Chen Yi tries to distill from Chinese and Western traditional music the essential character and spirit and to develop materials abstractly in accordance with new concepts. Duo Ye No. 2, Ge Xu (Antiphony), Piano Concerto, Momentum, Fiddle Suite, Eleanor's Gift, Dunhuang Fantasy, Percussion Concerto, Ba Yin, Chinese Folk Dance Suite and Second Symphony (for orchestra) thoughtfully combine the Western orchestral idiom with traditional Eastern pentatonic tonalities. Her octet, Sparkle, is a refreshing expression of glittering passion with magical textures, and the sextet, Near Distance, is a meditation on ancient culture and modern civilization, very skillfully drawing together the music of East and West. That, and the desire to create "real music" for society and future generations, is her main goal.

Ms. Chen has been commissioned to compose for Cleveland Orchestra, Seattle Symphony, Pacific Symphony, Orchestra of St. Luke's, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Women's Philharmonic, the Central Philharmonic of China, New York New Music Consort, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, the Music From China, Chanticleer, Yehudi Menuhin, Yo-Yo Ma, Evelyn Glennie and the Singapore Symphony, the Rascher Saxophone Quartet and Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the Ying Quartet, San Francisco Citywinds, San Francisco Girls' Chorus, Ithaca College, Carnegie Hall, American Guild of Organists and the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra.¾ Her compositions have also been performed by the BBC Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Halle Orchestra, New York Philhamonic and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra; Iceland, San Francisco, Sacramento, Long Beach, Virginia, Duluth, Honolulu, South Bend, Oakland East Bay, Peoria symphonies; China National and Shanghai Symphonies, NHK, Japan and Tokyo Philharmonic, Tokyo Metropolitan, Taiwan, HK Philharmonic, Shanghai Radio, Macao Chamber Orchestras; Auckland Philharmonic, Munchner Symphoniker, Dresdner Sinfoniker and Honved Mannerchor, Symphony II, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong Sinfonietta, Aspen, Tanglewood, Cabrillo music festival orchestras, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, Berlin Quintet, Haba and Stamnic quartets, Chicago Symphony chamber ensemble, Washington DC Contemporary Music Forum, Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, California EAR Unit, CalArts New Century Players, Ensemble 2e2m, Boston Musica Viva, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Dinosaur Annex, Shanghai/Ciompi/Flux/Elements Quartets, BBC Singers, Elmer Iseler Singers, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Network for New Music, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center among many others.

In addition to composing, Ms. Chen also serves on the Board of Directors of Meet the Composer and Chamber Music America, on the Composer Advisory Board of the American Composers Orchestra, the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, and the International Alliance for Women in Music. ¾ She is a member of ASCAP and the American Music Center, and is also active as a violinist in new music and as an ethnomusicologist in Chinese music and is a frequent guest lecturer throughout the United States and China.¾¾ Since 1991 she has been¾ a co-editor of Music From China Newsletter, an English and Chinese bilingual publication, introducing Chinese music, both traditional and contemporary, to wider audience and scholars.

COLLECTION SCOPE AND CONTENTS

The Chen Yi Event Collection contains 2 boxes of materials exhibited in the Diehn Composers Room as part of the Virginia Arts Festival program "Mozart and More" presented April 28, 2004 in Chandler Hall. The collection also includes photographs and recordings.

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