Unsuk Chin
Unsuk Chin was born in Seoul, studied with Ligeti in Hamburg, and is now resident in Berlin * Winner of the 2004 Grawemeyer Award for her Violin Concerto No.1, the 2005 Arnold Schoenberg prize, the 2010 Prince Pierre Foundation Music Award, the 2017 Wihuri Sibelius Prize and the 2018 Kravis Prize * Her output features both electronic and acoustic scores * Music is modern in language, but lyrical and non-doctrinaire in communicative power * Acute ear for instrumentation, orchestral colour, and rhythmic imagery * Works performed worldwide by major orchestras, contemporary music ensembles and interpreters * Championed by conductors Kent Nagano, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Gustavo Dudamel, Simon Rattle, Markus Stenz, Peter Eötvös, David Robertson, Myung-Whun Chung and George Benjamin, and violinists Christian Tetzlaff, Viviane Hagner and Renaud Capuçon * Performed by Bavarian State Opera, Berlin Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Radio France Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and others * Programmed by contemporary music ensembles such as Ensemble Intercontemporain, London Sinfonietta, Klangforum Wien, Asko|Schönberg Ensemble, Ensemble Modern, Arditti Quartet and Kronos Quartet * Portrait CDs released on Deutsche Grammophon, Kairos and Analekta and Alice in Wonderland opera available on Unitel DVD * Artistic Director of Tongyeong International Festival in South Korea and Weiwuying International Music Festival in Taiwan from 2022
Works by Unsuk Chin include:
Acrostic–Wordplay (1991/93) for soprano and ensemble
Violin Concerto No.1 (2001) for violin and orchestra
Alice in Wonderland (2004-07) Opera in eight scenes
Looking Ahead: New opera Die dunkle Seite des Mondes (Dark Side of the Moon) announced by Hamburg State Opera for premiere in May 2025.
Video: View an interview with Unsuk Chin talking about her life and music.
"My music is a reflection of my dreams. I try to render into music the visions of immense light and of an incredible magnificence of colours that I see in all my dreams, a play of light and colours floating through the room and at the same time forming a fluid sound sculpture. Its beauty is very abstract and remote, but it is for these very qualities that it addresses the emotions and can communicate joy and warmth." — Unsuk Chin, 2003
"a formidable ear for sonority and for mining the expressive potential of the slightest nuances of pitch and pulse." — The Guardian
