Chinary Ung

Chinary Ung ( ) (born November 24, 1942, in Takéo, Cambodia) is a composer currently living in California, United States.

Career

After arriving in the US in 1965 to study clarinet, he turned to composition studies with Chou Wen-chung and Mario Davidovsky, receiving a Doctor of Musical Arts from Columbia University in 1974. In 1988, he became the first American to win the University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for musical composition. Additionally, he received the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, as well as awards from The American Academy of Arts and Letters, Asia Foundation, Asian Cultural Council, Rockefeller Foundation, Ford Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, Joyce Foundation, and The National Endowment for the Arts.

In October 2007 the Del Sol String Quartet was invited to premiere the composer's Spiral X playing the Library of Congress' collection of Stradivarius instruments.

Ung taught music at Northern Illinois University, Connecticut College, the University of Pennsylvania, and Arizona State University, before being appointed to the faculty at the University of California, San Diego. In 2013, UC San Diego promoted Ung to the rank of Distinguished Professor.

Ung's music is published by C. F. Peters Corporation and his music is recorded on New World Records, Bridge Records, Cambria, London Records, Other Minds, Oodiscs, Nami Records, Kojima Records, Albany Records, Norton Recordings, Composers Recording Incorporated, Folkways Records, and Koch International.

Awards

University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition (1989) for Inner Voices Friedheim Award (1989) for Spiral American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters (1981, 1988) John D. Rockefeller 3rd Award from the Asian Cultural Council (2014) American Academy of Arts and Letters (2020)

Selected list of works

1970 – Tall Wind, for soprano and chamber ensemble

1974 – Mohori, for soprano and chamber ensemble

1980 – Khse Buon, for solo cello or viola

1985 – Child Song, for alto flute, viola, harp

1986 – Inner Voices, for orchestra

1987 – Spiral, for cello, piano, and percussion

1989 – Spiral II, for soprano, tuba, and piano

1990 – Grand Spiral: Desert Flowers Bloom, for symphonic band

1992 – Spiral VI, for clarinet, violin, cello, and piano

1995 – Antiphonal Spirals, for orchestra

1997 – Seven Mirrors, for solo piano

References

External links

Profile at Columbia

Profile at UCSD

The Ensemble Sospeso

1942 births

Living people

21st-century classical composers

Cambodian composers

Cambodian expatriates in the United States

University of California, San Diego faculty

People from Takéo province

Male classical composers

21st-century male musicians