Chinese composer Yan Yue, based in Beijing, writes ritual music which engages with ancient artistic expressions—especially with ancient traditions and material cultures as relics, fractured by history. He creates highly gestural music which juxtaposes human behaviors from cultures spanning the millennia. His work centers around non-Western instruments (particularly through exploring the interaction and interchanging of traditional performance practices), collaborative multimedia installations (including a recent collaboration with professors at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing), and live-electronics. He is Co-Founder and Co-Artistic Director of AIR Contemporary Music Collective.

Yan Yue holds a Bachelor of Music degree with High Distinction in composition from the Eastman School of Music. He has studied with Robert Morris, Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, Oliver Schneller, and Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon, and was awarded the composition department’s Bernard Rogers Memorial Prize, Anthony and Carolyn Donato Prize, and Belle S. Gitelman Award. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in composition at the HfMDK Frankfurt, studying under the tutorship of Orm Finnendahl.