Composer / Yi-Hsien Chen

Yi-Hsien Chen is a Taiwanese composer. He has received degrees from Taipei National University of the Arts and National Taiwan Normal University. In 2016, he began to pursue Ph.D. with major in music theory and composition at UC San Diego where he studied with Katharina Rosenberger, Chinary Ung, and Lei Liang who is his advisor and committee. He was awarded with full scholarship from UC San Diego for five years. He is currently an assistant professor at the Department of Music in National Sun-Yat Sen University.

Chen engages in composing for a wide variety of musical styles and involving multidisciplinary collaboration. He has created music spanning across various instrumentations including orchestra, ensemble, electroacoustics, theater music, and soundtrack. His works has been selected and performed by renowned ensembles at festivals, such as Mivos Quartet in “June in Buffalo,” National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra in the competition of “Voice of the New and Brilliant – The Sound of Formosa,” and “Weiwuying International Music Festival.” Chen also received commissioning award, “What’s the Score?” sponsored by the Aaron Copland House to collaborate with the students in University City High School to create a new piece for concert band.

In addition to being a composer, Chen has participated the project, “Hearing Seascapes,” to collaborate with Scripps Institution of Oceanography, where he worked with scholars to develop sonic art works combined with immersive technology and the data of oceanic science. With this experience, Chen was awarded two years scholarship provided by the Taiwanese government, Ministry of Education, for his research on this project.