Akademik

b. 1953, Beijing

Composer

Zhou Long is best known for the sensitive and intelligent way he integrates Chinese and Western musical elements. He enrolled in the Central Conservatory of Music in 1977. After graduating in 1983 he served as the Composer-in-Residence with the China Broadcasting Symphony. Zhou came to the United States in 1985 to study composition at Columbia University under Chou Wen-Chung, Mario Davidovsky and George Edwards. He received his doctorate in 1993.

Zhou’s music is imbued with the elegant, sensitive and tranquil spirit of classical Chinese art and literature. Yet he is also a master at exploiting limited material to its maximum potential. The Ineffable, written for mixed Western and Chinese instruments, is a perfect blend of these two aspects. For over a decade, Zhou has served as music director of the Chinese instrument ensemble Music From China in New York City, and he received ASCAP’s Adventurous Programming Award in 1999. He was the Music Alive! Composer-in-Residence for the Seattle Symphony’s ‘Silk Road Project’ Festival with Yo-Yo Ma in 2002. Zhou’s music has been recorded on major labels, as well as performed by major orchestras and ensembles all over the world. He has won the Masterprize (BBC, EMI, London Symphony) and the CalArts/Alpert Award in the Arts, as well as the Barlow International Competition. Zhou has been Visiting Professor of Composition at the University of Missouri—Kansas City Conservatory of Music since 2001.