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Liang, Lei (b. November 28, 1972, Tianjin). Chinese-born American composer of mostly stage and chamber works that have been performed throughout the world; he is also active as a musicologist.
Mr. Liang is the son of the musicologists Liang Mao-chun (b. 1940) and Cai Liang-yu (b. 1940). He studied piano in China as a child. He later studied composition with Robert Cogan and Lee Hyla at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston from 1992–98, where he earned his BM and MM in composition with distinction in performance, as well as the George Whitefield Chadwick Medal and the Tourjée Alumni Scholarship Award, both in 1996. He studied composition with Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Chaya Czernowin, Mario Davidovsky, Joshua Fineberg, Elliott Gyger, Magnus Lindberg, and Bernard Rands at Harvard University from 2001–06, where he was a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow from 2002–04 and where he earned his PhD.
He earned numerous prizes as both a composer and pianist in China while a child, including three honors in the Xinghai piano music competition (special distinction, 1984; Third Prize, 1987; Second Prize, 1988), where his early piano music has been in the mandatory repertoire since 1984, and Second Prize for piano performance in the Jing-Jin-Sui competition (1988). In addition, the Beijing Qingnianbao – Beijing Youth Daily named him one of its ten Persons of the Year (1989). More recently, he was a Junior Fellow of the Harvard University Society of Fellows (1998–2001) and he received a bursary from the Experimentalstudio of the Heinrich-Strobel-Stiftung in Freiburg (2004), an honorable mention in the Aliénor Awards for harpsichord composition competition in Washington, DC (2004, for Some Empty Thoughts of a Person from Edo) and the George Arthur Knight Prize from Harvard University (2006, for Serashi Fragments). Lastly, he was a finalist in the Thailand saxophone composition competition in Nakonpathom (2006, for Parallel Gardens). He has received commissions from flautist Masahiro Arita, shakuhachi (bamboo flute)-player Reian Bennett, the Callithumpian Consort, the Core Ensemble, pianist Stephen Drury, the Harvard University Asia Center, saxophonist Chien-Kwan Lin, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the Meridian Arts Ensemble, the Philharmonisches Orchester Heidelberg, the ensemble Pro Musicis, World-Wide Concurrent Premieres, Inc., erhu (Chinese violin)-player Xu Ke, and the Ying Quartet, among other ensembles, organizations, and soloists.
As a musicologist, Mr. Liang is especially interested in the preservation of traditional Asian music. As such, he has co-produced historical recordings from the Nei Monggol region of China and has digitized historical recordings for the Music Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Arts in Beijing. In addition, he has recorded an extensive interview with jinghu (2-string Peking Opera fiddle)-player Ni Qiu-ping for the Archive of World Music at the Loeb Music Library of Harvard University. His articles about his research and other elements of Asian music have appeared in numerous journals and newspapers in China, South Korea and the USA, notably in the journals Renmin Yinyue – People's Music and Yinyue Zhoubao – Music Weekly, both in Beijing, as well as in China and the West – The Birth of a New Music (2007, edited by Edward Green, Contemporary Music Review).
He has taught as an honorary professor at the Conservatory of Music in Wuhan in 2000 and as Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Shaanxi Normal University College of Arts in Xi'an since 2004. He taught Chinese music, composition and music theory as a visiting assistant professor of music at Middlebury College in 2006–07 and has taught composition and music theory as an assistant professor at the University of California at San Diego since 2007, where he has also served as director of the undergraduate composition program since 2007.
He has lived in the USA since 1990.
CONTACT INFORMATION
E-mail address: lei@lei-liang.com
Street address (university): Mr. Lei Liang, University of California at San Diego, Dept. of Music, 9500 Gilman Dr., La Jolla, CA 92093-0326, USA
Telephone (university): 858 822 1434
Fax (university): 858 534 8502
Website: http://www.lei-liang.com/
SELECT LIST OF WORKS
STAGE: Somniloquy (choreography by Masashi Harada), male Butoh dancer, trombone, 1992; Dialectal Percussions (choreography by Jeong-Ae Yoon), percussion, 1994 (may be performed as a concert work); Garden Nine (vocalise, choreography by Ling Chu), 8 female voices, 4 male voices, piano, 2 pairs of rocks, 1996 (may be performed as a concert work); Der gute Mensch von Sezuan (incidental music, play by Bertolt Brecht), 3 mechanical metronomes (around hall; 1 operator), CD, 1998; Other Encounter (choreography by the Tremont Theatre Dance Project), CD, 1999; Memories of Xiaoxiang (choreography by You Shao-ching), alto saxophone, 4-track tape, 2003 (may be performed as a concert work); Garden Eight (choreography by Tiffany Rhynard), female dancer, piano, 2006 (stage version of piano work)
ORCHESTRAL: Pausing, Awaiting the Wind to Rise..., 2003 (version of piano work); Brush-Stroke, small orchestra (15 players), 2004; Parallel Gardens, saxophone orchestra (24 players), 2006
CHAMBER MUSIC: Peking Opera Soliloquy, alto saxophone, 1994; Dialectal Percussions, percussion, 1994 (concert version of stage work); Garden Six, soprano saxophone, 4 alto saxophones, baritone saxophone, 1996 (also version for any 6 saxophones, 1996); Garden Eight, any player, 1996; Feng, cello, 1998 (also version for violin, 2000); Garden Eleven (text by Li Po), soprano, pipa (Chinese lute), ensemble (flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, mandolin, violin, viola, cello, double bass, piano/harpsichord/electronic keyboard, vibraphone), 1998; Invisible Garden, 13-string koto (Japanese zither), zheng (Chinese zither), kayagŭm (Korean zither), 2 pairs of rocks, 1998; March Cathedral, soprano saxophone, 4 alto saxophones, baritone saxophone, electric guitar, piano, harpsichord, 6 percussion, 1998; For Shakuhachi, 1999; Lake, 2 flutes (both + alto flute, 2nd + bass flute), 1999 (also version for flute, clarinet, 2004); Milou, soprano saxophone, 4 alto saxophones, baritone saxophone, electric guitar, piano, harpsichord, 4 percussion (2 around hall), 1999; Extend, guanzi (Chinese oboe), alto saxophone, 2000; Parts for a Floating Space, soprano saxophone (+ baritone saxophone), percussion, 2001; For a Lost Stone, cello, percussion, 2002; Trio, cello, piano, percussion, 2002; Tian for Four, sheng (Chinese mouth organ), trumpet, guitar, zheng, 2003; Gobi Polyphony, erhu, cello, 2003; Gobi Canticle, violin, cello, 2004; Motion Parallel, sheng, guanzi, 2004; In Praise of Shadows, flute, 2005; Serashi Fragments, string quartet, 2005; Septet, flute (+ piccolo), clarinet (+ bass clarinet), zheng, violin, double bass, piano, percussion, 2006; Winged Creatures, 2 violins, cello, harpsichord, 2006; Gobi Gloria, string quartet, 2006; Ascension, French horn, 2 trumpets, trombone, tuba, percussion, 2007–08
CHORAL: Garden Nine, 8 female voices, 4 male voices, piano, 2 pairs of rocks, 1996 (concert version of stage work); A Dream within a Dream (text by the composer, after Bada Shanren), mixed chorus, soprano saxophone, piano, 2007
PIANO: Garden Eight, 1996 (also stage version); Against Piano, piano (2 players, one inside piano), 1999; My Windows (suite), 1996–2007 (each of its four movements may be performed separately: Tian, 1996–2004; Seven Rays of the Sun, 2007; Magma, 2007; Pausing, Awaiting the Wind to Rise..., 2003 [also version for orchestra]); fragile zones, 2008
HARPSICHORD: Some Empty Thoughts of a Person from Edo, 2001
ELECTROACOUSTIC: Project 121899 (sound installation), 1999; Jong-Jin's Rain, 2-track tape, 2002; Memories of Xiaoxiang, alto saxophone, 4-track tape, 2003 (concert version of stage work)
FILM SCORES (DIRECTOR): The Giver, 2002 (Agnes Mei-Yee Chu); Shall We Sing?, 2005 (Reina Higashitani)
DISCOGRAPHY (as composer)
March Cathedral; Against Piano; Garden Eight; Garden Six; Dialectal Percussions; Feng; Extend; Garden Nine; Other Encounter. Bao Jian, guanzi; Lenny Bretton, Eric Hewitt, Conrad Kline, Shyen Lee, Chien-Kwan Lin, Samuel Lorber, Ken Radnovsky, Greg Ridlington, Oliver Schneller, saxophones; Van Weng, electric guitar; Feng Hew, cello; Lei Liang, piano, harpsichord; Jung Mi Lee, Jon Sakata, pianos; Christopher DeChiara, Jeremy Friedman, Phillip Kiamie, Matthew Masie, Eric Millstein, Mei Ying Ng, John Spirtas, Gary Wallen, percussion; Tamara Brooks/New England Conservatory Chamber Singers (Encounter Records, 2000)
Some Empty Thoughts of a Person from Edo. Takae Ohnishi, harpsichord (Opal Records: ORH-1311, 2001)
Gobi Gloria. Ying Quartet (Telarc Records: 80690, 2008)
DISCOGRAPHY (as compiler)
The Commemorative Edition of the Renowned Mongolian Chaorer Player Serashi (produced by Lei Liang and Wang Yin-yin). (China Record Corporation: CRC CCD-2455, 2005)
(Last updated on May 29, 2008)
