Born on April 4, 1953, in Guangzhou, China, into a family of doctors with a strong interest in classical music, Dr. Chen started studying violin and piano when she was only three She received music degrees from the Beijing Central Conservatory (BA & MA) and Columbia University in the City of New York (DMA).
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As the recipient of the prestigious Charles Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (2001-2004), Chen has been the Lorena Searcey Cravens/Millsap/Missouri Distinguished Professor in Composition at the Conservatory of the University of Missouri-Kansas City since 1998. She also served on the composition faculty of Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (1996-98), Composer-in-Residence with the Women's Philharmonic, Chanticleer, and Aptos Creative Arts Center in San Francisco (1993-96), supported by Meet The Composer's New Residencies Program.. She is the first woman to receive a master degree in composition in China in June 1986 when she gave the whole evening concert of her orchestral works in Beijing. She is also the first woman to give a whole evening multimedia orchestral concert (for orchestra, choir, Chinese traditional instrumental soloists, dance, image projection - Chinese Myths Cantata - in the US in May 1996 with three sold out concerts in San Francisco. . She was invited back to China to give another whole evening concert of her orchestral and choral works presented by the China National Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Beijing in 2001.
Dr. Chen's composition is a hybrid of East (Chinese flavour, style and spirit) and West (structure, shape and physical orchestration). Being performed from Beijing, to New York and San Francisco, from London to Tokyo and Singapore, and from Munich to Auckland, Tashkent and Sao Paulo, her music has reached wide range of audiences and tremendously inspired people with different cultural background throughout the world.
Dr. Chen received many awards: fellowships from Guggenheim Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts; Lieberson Award from American Academy of Arts and Letters, first prize from the Chinese National Composition Competition (Duo Ye for piano solo), the Lili Boulanger Award (National Women Composers Resource Center), the Sorel Medal (New York University), the Alpert Award (CalArts Institute), a Grammy Award, the Eddie Medora King Composition Prize (University of Texas), the 2001 ASCAP Concert Music Award, the 2002 Elise Stoeger Award from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Friendship Ambassador Award from the Snow Memorial Fund, the honorary doctorate from Lawrence University, Wisconsin, and the adventurous programming award from the American Society of Composers, Authors & Publishers (for Music From China in New York).
Major commissions are received from Koussevitzky, Fromm, Ford, Rockefeller, Roche foundations, National Endowment for the Arts, Chamber Music America, Meet The Composer, Creative Work Fund, San Francisco Art Commission, Mary Cary Trust, NYSCA, Carnegie Hall, New Heritage Music Foundation, the American Guild of Organists, Barlow Endowment for Music Composition, Eastman School, Ithaca College, Bradley University, Miami University, Chorus America, the 6th World Symposium on Choral Music, the Lucerne Music Festival in Switzerland, Seattle Symphony, Yo-Yo Ma & Pacific Symphony, Rascher Saxophone Quartet & Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Yehudi Menuhin, Evelyn Glennie & Singapore Symphony, The Women's Philharmonic, Brooklyn Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and many others.
Dr. Chen's music is performed worldwide and published by Theodore Presser Company. Her works are extensively recorded. . The third album of her orchestra works Momentum and cello concerto Eleanorâ's Gift are among the most recently released CDs. Most recent premieres in 2004 include Ballad, Dance and Fantasy, just to name a few. She is married to Zhou Long, a composer.
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