Huang Ruo

The works of composer Huang Ruo mix traditional Chinese elements with Western styles, including those falling under the avant-garde classification. Huang is also the founder and leader of the avant-garde performance group Future in REverse and is a noted educator. Huang Ruo (in the Chinese naming system, Huang is his family name) was born in 1976 on Hainan Island off the southern Chinese mainland. Coming of age as China emerged from the Cultural Revolution, he benefited from a wide variety of influences. His father, a composer, gave him instruction in piano and composition. Huang also heard Western rock and jazz, newly legalized in China. When he was 12, Huang entered the Shanghai Conservatory, studying both Chinese and Western music with Deng Erbo. In 1995, he won the Henry Mancini Award at Switzerland's International Film and Music Festival, after which he decided to continue his education in the U.S. He earned a bachelor's degree at Oberlin College, entering under a full scholarship, and went on for a doctorate at the Juilliard School in Manhattan, studying with Samuel Adler. In 2001, Huang co-founded the International Contemporary Ensemble, a group of about 30 musicians oriented toward new works, and he founded Future in REverse (FIRE), an ensemble devoted to multimedia and cross-genre projects, in 2005. He remains the latter group's artistic director and conductor. As early as 2007, Huang's works appeared on recordings; his Chamber Concerto Cycle was released that year on the Naxos label in performances by the International Contemporary Ensemble. Huang went on to take first prizes at the International Composition Competition in Luxembourg in 2008 and at the Celebrate Asia! competition in 2010. The latter award was for the orchestral work The Yellow Earth, which was programmed by the Seattle Symphony the following year. Huang's works have been performed by leading orchestras in the U.S. (including the Philadelphia Orchestra), Europe (the Kiel Philharmonic and other groups), and Asia (the Hong Kong Philharmonic). His chamber works have been performed by Quatuor Diotima, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and the Asko/Schönberg Ensemble, among others. Huang served the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam as its composer-in-residence, the orchestra's first. His works, including the String Quartet No. 1 ("The Three Tenses") and the opera An American Soldier (2014), draw on genres as diverse as Chinese folk music, Western avant-garde music, rock, and jazz. More than 20 of Huang's compositions have appeared on recordings, including his string quartet A Dust in Time, issued by the Del Sol Quartet on the Bright Shiny Things label in 2021.
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