Previous New Music Readings Recipients
Yangfan Xu, Bya (2021) | 2024 New Music Readings Recipient
Yangfan Xu is a Chinese-born US-based composer who comes from a musical family in Lanzhou, Gansu province. Xu was winner of the 2023 Boston New Music Initiative Commission Competition, Society for New Music's 2021 Israel/Pellman Award, and the 2021 New Juilliard Ensemble (NJE) Composition Competition. She was also awarded First Prize of the 2020 Hausmann Quartet Quarantine Composition Competition. Her commissioned work Fantastic Creatures of the Mountains and Seas premiered at the Lincoln Center in a concert by the NJE in 2022.
Xu has received commissions from saxophonist Kenneth Radnofsky and the New York Choreographic Institute affiliated with the New York City Ballet. Her compositions have been performed by professional groups such as the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Friction Quartet, Hausmann Quartet, SFCM New Music Ensemble, Choral Chameleon, Keyed Kontraptions and Ravel Virtual Studios.
Xu received a bachelor’s degree in composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and master’s degree in composition at The Juilliard School. She is a current DMA student at the New England Conservatory of Music with studio teacher Kati Agócs.
Learn more about Yangfan Xu by visiting her website at www.yangfanxu.com.
Cristian Andres Lazo Remedi, FENIX (2022-23) | 2024 New Music Readings Recipient
Born in Santiago de Chile, Cristian Andres Lazo Remedi is a composer, arranger, and keyboardist trained at the Universidad de Chile. His music has a notorious influence of progressive rock and metal, as well as jazz fusion. Christian was awarded first prize of the 2021 Luis Advis Composition Competition in the Docta Music category, and first place of the First Composition Competition for Symphonic Band "SOM Luis Mella Toro." He additionally was a finalist of the 2023 Luis Advis Composition Competition.
He has extensive experience as a liturgical organist, having worked as official organist of the Obispado Castrense de Chile. He currently works as organist for the First Branch in Chile of "Christian Science". Since 2012, he was pianist for the Institutional Choir of the Universidad Tecnológica Metropolitana. Christian orchestrated the first historical musical of lyric-symphonic style of Chile, Los Hermanos Carrera, by Daniel Olmos Müller. He additionally orchestrated the symphonic band premiere of the musical Los 77 Valientes Héroes de la Concepción, also by Daniel Olmos, performed by the Concert Band of the Chilean Army.
Austin Ali, Totality (2024) | 2024 New Music Readings Recipient
Austin Ali is an award-winning composer, trumpet player, and conductor from Dallas, Texas. In addition to writing for the concert stage, Austin composed, orchestrated, and conducted the score to a feature-length film, Dear Leo, in Austin, TX in 2019. Austin holds degrees in Music Composition and Plan II Honors from the University of Texas at Austin. He has received the George H. Mitchell Award for Academic Excellence for his Plan II Thesis A Musical Portrait of Triton, the Rogue Moon of Neptune. Austin currently studies music composition in the Herb Alpert School of Music at University of California, Los Angeles.
In addition to composing, Austin has performed with the Big Wy’s Brass Band. The group showcased their original music at the IGA International Jazz Festival in Guatemala in 2017, performed for the president of Costa Rica in Limón, Costa Rica, were invited as Official South By Southwest (SXSW) Artists from 2018-2020, and won “Best Horns” in the 2019-2020 Austin Music Awards.
Learn more about Austin Ali by visiting his website at austinali.com.