THE NEW YORK TIMES: “Ms. Ko’s vivid orchestral palette included fragile whispers in the upper strings interrupted by

ominous brass flourishes, with sonic explosions following more sparsely orchestrated fragments.” (“Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide”)

NEW YORK MUSIC DAILY:

“Young Concert Artists has helped launch the careers of a formidable list, including Pinchas Zukerman,

Richard Goode and Dawn Upshaw. Ko is their latest composer-in-residence: based on this piece, they

chose spectacularly well.” (“Moves and Remains”)

THE NEW YORK TIMES:

“Her captivating score plays musical games of sound and color.” (“Games of Belief”)

ASU NOW (AZ): “Tonia Ko, an innovative, cross-disciplinary artist, gave a one-of-a-kind, interactive

preconcert performance exploring the unique capacities of everyday materials before her symphony ‘Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide’ was featured.”

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN:

“The strength of Ko’s piece was in the details. The atmosphere was immediate and artful.”

Photo: Matt Dine

YOUNG CONCERT ARTISTS, INC. 250 West 57 Street, Suite 1222 New York, NY 10107

T: (212) 307-6655 F: (212) 581-8894 management@yca.org www.yca.org

2015-2017 Young Concert Artists Composer-in-Residence

2015 and 2016 BMI Student Composer Awards

2015-2016 New York Youth Symphony First Music Commission for orchestra

Rapee Sagarik Prize, 2014 Thailand International Composers Competition

2014 Otto R. Stahl Memorial Award, Cornell University

2012-2016 Cornell University Sage Fellowship

2013 Charles Ives Scholarship • 2013-14 Copland House Residency Award

Libby Larsen Prize, 2012 IAWM Search for New Music Competition

TONIA KO, composer

YOUNG COMPOSER TONIA KO AWARDED GUGGENHEIM FELLOWSHIP BY BLOUIN ARTINFO | NEW YORK | APRIL 17, 2018

The Board of Trustees of the John Simon Guggenheim

Memorial Foundation has announced the 2018

Guggenheim Fellowship for 29 year-old Young Concert

Artists composer Tonia Ko.

Appointed on the basis of prior achievement and

exceptional promise, Ko was part of a group chosen from

almost 3,000 applicants. In addition to this, Ko has

received a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American

Academy of Arts and Letters. She is a three-time winner of

the Eastman School of Music’s Louis Lane Prize, and won

the Rapee Sagarik Prize at the 2014 Thailand

International Composers Competition.

Her music has been praised by The New York Times for its “captivating” details and “vivid

orchestral palette.” Her fascination with texture and physical movement play into a larger

theme of the relationship between visual art and music. As the 2015-2017 Young Concert

Artists Composer-in-Residence, Tonia Ko received two commissions to write works for the

debuts of both pianist Daniel Lebhardt and oboist Olivier Stankiewicz. These works were

premiered in recital debuts in the Young Concert Artists Series in New York at Merkin

Concert Hall and in Washington D.C. at the Kennedy Center, to critical acclaim. Her work

"Moves and Remains" premieres in the Young Concert Artists in New York and Washington

D.C. this season, by violinist Benjamin Baker and pianist Daniel Lebhardt.

Tonia Ko, composer

ASU Now

ASU pursues diverse, innovative musical journey by Lynne MacDonald - April 23, 2018

In pursuit of the diverse and innovative musical journey Projecting All Voices, an initiative of Arizona State University’s Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts, the School of Music’s orchestral program is leading the way nationally in weaving together compelling programming, high artistic standards and a message of inclusion and understanding. This year’s guest artists included Tonia Ko, an innovative, cross-disciplinary artist who gave a one-of-a-kind, interactive preconcert performance exploring the unique capacities of everyday materials before her symphony “Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide” was featured. https://asunow.asu.edu/20180423-asu-school-music%E2%80%99s-orchestral-program-pursues-diverse-innovative-musical-journey

YOUNG CONCERT ARTISTS, INC. 1776 Broadway, Suite 1500 New York, NY 10019

Telephone: (212) 307-6655 management@yca.org www.yca.org

NEWS from Young Concert Artists, Inc.

______________________________________ NOTE: When editing, please do not delete references to Young Concert Artists.

Please do not use previously dated biographies. 04/2018

TONIA KO, composer

Recipient of a 2018 Guggenheim Fellowship, American composer Tonia Ko’s music has been praised by The New York Times for its “captivating” details and “vivid orchestral palette.” Her fascination with texture and physical movement play into a larger theme of the relationship between visual art and music. As the 2015-2017 Young Concert Artists Composer-in-Residence, Ms. Ko received two commissions to write works for the debuts of both pianist Daniel Lebhardt and oboist Olivier Stankiewicz. These works were premiered in recital debuts in the Young Concert Artists Series in New York at Merkin Concert Hall and in Washington, D.C at the Kennedy Center, to critical acclaim. Her work Moves and Remains premieres in the Young Concert Artists in New York and Washington, DC this season, by violinist Benjamin Baker and pianist Daniel Lebhardt. Ms. Ko has participated in the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute, culminating in a performance of her work by the orchestra with their Music Director Osmo Vänskä. As recipient of a New York Youth Symphony First Music Commission for orchestra, Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide was premiered in Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall. Recent commissions include a work for the Spektral Quartet through a grant from Chamber Music America’s Classical Commissioning program, a piano four-hands piece to be premiered by HOCKET, and a piece for violin solo, commissioned by Hayden’s Ferry Chamber Music Series. Other works will be performed at Indiana State University, by Arizona State University’s Orchestra, and by Da Capo Chamber Players. Recipient of a 2017 commission from Harvard University’s Fromm Music Foundation, Ms. Ko has also received a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and two BMI Student Composer Awards, grants and awards from Chamber Music America, and her works have been recognized by the Renee B. Fisher Foundation, Lin Yao Ji International Competition, New Music USA, International Alliance for Women in Music, Austin Peay State University, Chinese Fine Arts Society, and the Belvedere Chamber Music Festival. She is a three-time winner of the Eastman School of Music’s Louis Lane Prize, and won the Rapee Sagarik Prize at the 2014 Thailand International Composers Competition. Tonia was recently chosen as a Fellows in CULTIVATE, the Copland House’s acclaimed, annual emerging composers institute, was selected to complete a residency at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, and will be in residence at the MacDowell Colony in 2018. Other recent commissions are works for cellist Edward Arron and pianist Jeewon Park; for violin and piano inspired by Beethoven’s ten sonatas which premiered at the University of North Carolina by violinist Nick DeEugenio and pianist Mimi Solomon; a piece for chamber choir as part of Volti’s Choral Arts Lab in San Francisco; Between Us for cello and mezzo-soprano, which premiered at National Sawdust, presented as part of HOWL’s production of “Araby,” a show based on the James Joyce short story by the same name. Her works have also been performed by the FLUX Quartet, and at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Tanglewood Music Center, Aspen Music Festival, Wellesley Composers Conference, Young Composers Meeting at Apeldoorn (Netherlands), American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, and Shanghai Conservatory New Music Week. As a visual artist, Ms. Ko focuses on drawings and paintings that are abstract, organic, and lyrical, including an installation entitled Breath, Contained, opened under the Sibley Dome at Cornell University and featuring a traditional exhibition as well as live electronics to explore bubble wrap as a flexible medium for art and music. Recent interdisciplinary collaborations include songs for the musical Lady Macbeth, performed by the Perry Chiu Experimental Theatre in Hong Kong; and a piece for the Periapsis Music and Dance Company in Brooklyn. Born in Hong Kong and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii, Ms. Ko holds a DMA from Cornell University where she won the 2014 Otto R. Stahl Memorial Award and has worked with Steven Stucky and Kevin Ernste. She received her Master’s degree from Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, where she was awarded the 2011 Georgina Joshi Commission Prize, and her Bachelor’s degree from the Eastman School of Music.

Young Concert Artists, Inc.

1776 Broadway, Suite 1500, New York, NY 10019 telephone: (212) 307-6655 fax: (212) 581-8894 e-mail: yca@yca.org website: www.yca.org

TONIA KO, composer

LIST OF COMPOSITIONS

Instrumental - Large Ensemble

Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide for orchestra (8 minutes)

(3 flutes/piccolo, 2 oboes/English horn, 3 clarinets/bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns,

3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, 3 percussion, piano, harp, strings)

Commissioned by the First Music program, New York Youth Symphony

Premiered by the New York Youth Symphony conducted by Joshua Gersen in Stern Auditorium at Carnegie

Hall on March 6, 2016

Alta for orchestra (7 minutes)

Winner of 2013 Northridge Composition Prize

(2 flutes/piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, timpani,

3 percussion, harp, celesta, strings)

Premiered by California State University at Northridge Orchestra conducted by John Roscigno on February

26, 2014

Eyelids are Islands for chamber orchestra (11 minutes)

2014 Otto R. Stahl Memorial Award, Cornell University

(flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, trumpet, trombone, percussion, celesta, 2 violins, viola, cello, bass)

Written at the Copland House as part of Copland Residency Award

Premiered by the Festival Chamber Orchestra conducted by Chris Kim on April 12, 2014

Sunken Sky for chamber orchestra (10 minutes)

(flute/piccolo, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, trumpet, trombone, percussion, piano, 2 violins, viola, cello,

bass)

Commissioned by ensemble mise-en, supported by New Music USA

Premiered by ensemble mise-en conducted by David Bloom on December 19, 2012

Dwellings for wind ensemble (10 minutes)

(piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, E-flat clarinet, 3 B-flat clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons,

contrabassoon, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, euphonium, tuba, piano, harp, timpani, 3 percussion)

Premiered by the Eastman Wind Ensemble conducted by Mark Scatterday in Kodak Hall, Rochester, NY on

February 18, 2011

Instrumental – Solo and Chamber

Very Tall Very Bright for amplified chamber orchestra (7-8 minutes)

Will be premiered by wildUp, conducted by Christopher Rountree, at the LA Philharmonic Noon to

Midnight Festival, Los Angeles, CA on November 17, 2017

Phenomenal Hum for piano, four hands (8 minutes)

Will be premiered by HOCKET at the LA Philharmonic Noon to Midnight Festival, Los Angeles, CA on

November 18, 2017

Hum Phenomenon for clarinet, piano, violin, cello (6 minutes)

Written for the 2017 CULTIVATE institute

Premiered by Music from Copland House, Merestead, Mount Kisco, NY on June 11, 2017

Highwire for oboe and electronics (10 minutes)

Commissioned in 2017 by Young Concert Artists, Inc. for Olivier Stankiewicz

Premiered at Merkin Concert Hall on April 19, 2017

Reaction (Axis III) for flute and piano (9 minutes)

Commissioned by Zach Sheets and Wei-Han Wu

Premiered on the EQ concert series, Third Life Studio, Somerville, MA on January 13, 2016

Tribute (Axis II) for violin and piano (11 minutes)

Commissioned by violinist Nicholas DiEugenio for “The Beethoven Project”

Premiered on The Process Series at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill on September 30, 2016

Elegy (Axis I) for cello and piano (13 minutes)

Commissioned by Eugenia Zukerman for Clarion Concerts

Premiered at Hawthorne Valley Waldorf School, Ghent, NY on September, 10, 2016

Covers and Uncovers for flute, b-flat clarinet, horn, percussion, violin, viola, cello (12 minutes)

Commissioned by Emlyn Johnson for Music in the American Wild in honor of the U.S. National

Park Service centennial

Premiered at Locust Grove, Louisville, KY on June 9, 2016

Games of Belief for solo piano (13 minutes)

Winner of 2016 BMI Student Composer Award

Commissioned in 2015 by Young Concert Artists, Inc. for Daniel Lebhardt

Premiered at the Kennedy Center on February 23, 2016 and at Merkin Concert Hall on March 1, 2016

Real Voices and Imagined Clatter for four percussionists (12 minutes)

Premiered by So Percussion in the Cornell Concert Series, Bailey Hall, Ithaca, NY on October 26, 2014

Gone Flying for B-flat clarinet, viola, cello, and bass (8 minutes)

Commissioned by Cornell Mayfest

Premiered by Chen Halevi, David Quiggle, Clancy Newman, and Sam Shuhan at Barnes Hall, Cornell

University, Ithaca, NY on May 20, 2015

Little Spark of Madness for solo piano (4 minutes)

Commissioned by the Neighborhood Music School as part of the 2014 Renee B. Fisher Award

Premiered by William Yin at the Renee B. Fisher Competition Winner’s Concert, New Haven, CT on

May 16, 2015

Breath, Contained for amplified bubble wrap and electronics

Solo version (5 minutes)

Quintet version (13 minutes)

Premiered by Sandbox Percussion with Michael Compitello, Sibley Dome, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

on March 26, 2015

Blue Skin of the Sea for solo marimba (23 minutes)

Winner of 2015 BMI Student Composer Award

Commissioned by consortium members Michael Compitello, Gwendolyn Burgett, Ji Hye Jung, Ayano

Kataoka, Katelyn King, Ian Rosenbaum, Leah Scholes, Jeff Stern, and Daniel Tones

Premiered by Michael Compitello, Ensemble X at Carriage House Hayloft, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

on February 1, 2015

Escape-Landscape for string quartet (8 minutes)

Written for the FLUX Quartet

Premiered by the FLUX Quartet at St. Francis Auditorium, NM Museum of Art, Santa Fe Chamber Music

Festival on August 8, 2014

Plush Earth in Four Pieces for violin and piano (9 minutes)

Winner of 2014 Rapee Sagarik Prize

Written for Xak Bjerken and Vesselin Gellev

Premiered at Barnes Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY on April 21, 2014

Melting Points for flute, clarinet, percussion, piano, and string quartet (6 minutes)

Premiered by the New Fromm Players of the Tanglewood Music Center at Seiji Ozawa Hall on July 20, 2013

Hush for percussion and cello (12 minutes)

Finalist, 2015 BMI Student Composer Award

Commissioned by New Morse Code: Michael Compitello and Hannah Collins

Premiered by New Morse Code, faculty recital, Cornell University, Barnes Hall, Ithaca, NY on

February 9, 2013

Still Life Crumbles for violin and double manual harpsichord (7 minutes)

First Prize, 2012 Lin Yao Ji International Composition Competition

Finalist, 2013 ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award

Premiered by violinist Ariana Kim and keyboardist Michael Pecak, Cornell Contemporary Chamber Players,

Barnes Hall, Ithaca, NY on November 4, 2012

Glass Echoes for solo horn (6 minutes)

Third Prize, 2012 Arioso Musica Domani International Composition Prize

Commissioned by hornist Michael Walker

Premiered by Michael Walker, Student Composition Recital, IU Auer Hall, Bloomington, IN on

April 17, 2012

Moon Lullaby for oboe, string trio and vibraphone (8 minutes)

Second Prize, 2010 Chinese Fine Arts Society Migratory Journeys International Composition

Competition

Written for oboist Michael McGowan

Premiered by the Civitas Ensemble, Art Institute of Chicago, Fullerton Hall, Chicago, IL on March 26, 2012

Siteless Structures for solo piano (11 minutes)

Winner of Libby Larsen Prize, 2012 IAWM Search for New Music

Written for keyboardist Michael Pecak

Premiered at 42nd Annual Festival of New Music at Ball State University, Muncie, IN on Mar. 24, 2012

Moments for piccolo and guitar (6 minutes)

Second Prize, 2010 Belvedere Chamber Music Festival Composition Contest

Finalist, 2010 ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award

Premiered by Luna Nova New Music Ensemble, Grace-St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Memphis, TN on June

25, 2010

Spindrift for violin (5 minutes)

First Prize, Lin Yao Ji International Composition Competition, 2012

Premiered by Stephanie Song, American Conservatory at Fontainebleau, Fontainebleau Palace, France on July

30, 2009

Tonia Ko, composer

Tonia Ko’s “Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide” Vivien Schweitzer | The New York Times| March 7, 2016

A listener might assume that a new symphony called “Strange Sounds and Explosions Worldwide” would depict perilous global situations. But the title of Tonia Ko’s new symphony alludes to fireworks and other joyful events, as well as natural ones like erupting volcanoes. In its premiere on Sunday afternoon at Carnegie Hall, Ms. Ko’s piece was performed by the New York Youth Symphony, which offers tuition-free training and performance opportunities to musicians ages 12 to 22. The ensemble, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, has a strong composition program and has awarded commissions to 139 composers age 30 and under since 1984 through its First Music project. At its annual Carnegie concerts, the ensemble presents one of those commissions. Joshua Gersen, its music director, conducted Ms. Ko’s work. In writing the symphony, Ms. Ko, 27, who was born in Hong Kong and raised in Hawaii, conducted spectral analyses of audio clips of explosions and experimented with other sounds. The resulting piece for acoustic instruments proved more somber and eerie than jubilant, its initial rumblings morphing into dramatic surges. Ms. Ko’s vivid orchestral palette included fragile whispers in the upper strings interrupted by ominous brass flourishes, with sonic explosions following more sparsely orchestrated fragments. Next, Mr. Gersen conducted the young musicians in a stirring rendition of Tchaikovsky’s smoldering Piano Concerto No. 1, with Steven Lin as the able soloist. A few slips aside, he tackled the virtuoso passages and daunting octaves with aplomb and rendered the lyrical sections with an introspective grace. Rachmaninoff’s darkly colored, richly melodic “Symphonic Dances,” his final composition, concluded the program. At times it could have used more rhythmic bite, but it offered a chance for all sections of the ensemble to shine, with lush, passionate playing from the strings and admirable contributions from the winds and brass.

NEWS from Young Concert Artists, Inc.

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Telephone: (212) 307-6655 Fax: (212) 581-8894 management@yca.org

Tonia Ko, composer

Daniel Lebhardt Shows Daring Command in a New York Debut Anthony Tommasini | The New York Times| March 2, 2016

Even before the 23-year-old Hungarian pianist Daniel Lebhardt began his New York debut recital on Tuesday night, I was impressed by the adventurous program he had chosen. For this performance at Merkin Concert Hall, Mr. Lebhardt, a winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, played an overlooked Beethoven sonata, followed by the premiere of a substantive piece by Tonia Ko, ending with a cornerstone of the repertory (by a fellow Hungarian): Liszt’s daunting Sonata in B minor. It took imagination to open with Beethoven’s Sonata No. 16 in G (Op. 31, No. 1). While many of this composer’s works are run through with humor, this ebullient sonata can seem almost slapstick. The opening Allegro unfolds in bursts of spiraling runs and scale fragments punctuated by chords that are slightly, and deliberately, out of sync. Taking a daringly fast tempo, Mr. Lebhardt dispatched the music with scintillating crispness and conveyed its brash humor. But the breathless energy of his account also teased out the sonata’s heedless daring. He revealed the slyness at work in the Adagio, with its almost mock-elegant trills and swirling passagework. The final Rondo was an impish, brilliant delight. Ms. Ko, a composer in residence with Young Concert Artists, wrote in a program note that her “Games of Belief” was inspired by Schumann’s fanciful piano works, especially his “Scenes From Childhood” suite. Her captivating score plays musical games of sound and color, often requiring Mr. Lebhardt to strike keys with one hand while, leaning into the piano, moving his other over the strings to create sounds that combined percussive thumps with sighing harmonics. The more traditional elements involved rustling runs, skittish riffs and high tinkling figures that evoked pagoda chimes, all splendidly played. Liszt’s visionary Sonata in B minor is an epic fantasy lasting nearly 30 minutes, shifting from bursts of wildness to passages of profundity. Just playing it commandingly, as Mr. Lebhardt did, is difficult enough. He brought narrative sweep and youthful abandon to the piece, along with power, poetry and formidable technique. As an encore, he played Bartok’scharming “Evening in Transylvania” from “10 Easy Piano Pieces,” the perfect cap to a demanding program.

NEWS from Young Concert Artists, Inc.

Daniel Lebhardt at Merkin Concert Hall. Credit: Hiroyuki Ito for The New York Times

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Tonia Ko, composer

Music in the American Wild plays mockingbird Grace Jean | Washington Post | June 20, 2016

Water-filled bowls and colorful desk bells played key roles in a spirited and intriguing Sunday afternoon concert by an innovative Eastman School of Music-derived ensemble at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Concluding the first half of its summer tour in Washington, the seven members of the Music in the American Wild ensemble showcased six composers’ nature­-inspired works, commissioned to celebrate the National Park Service’s centennial. Evoking the sounds of a forest in Aaron Travers’s “Sanctuary,” flutist Emlyn Johnson, clarinetist Ellen Breakfield-Glick and percussionist Colleen Bernstein mimicked birds through song, woodblocks and chimes as violinist Hanna Hurwitz, violist Emily Sheil, cellist Daniel Ketter and French hornist Lauren Becker created cityscape sounds to represent humanity’s encroachment. Insects, bullfrogs and even a romping bear came to life in Daniel Pesca’s “From Noon to Noon,” while the joy of wilderness hiking poured forth in Robert Morris’s “Birds Soaring Over Mountain Paths.” Tonia Ko’s “Covers and Uncovers” required the strings and winds to rattle and ring brightly hued desk bells and the percussionist to “play” a metal tube using a threaded metal rod – sights that appeared as curious as they first sounded. However, the juxtaposition of earthy noises with ringing bells and instrumental tones worked well to create an abstract landscape vista. In Kevin Ernste’s “Interregnum,” the musicians alternated between striking silver bowls with mallets, pouring and swishing water, and playing their instruments to mesmerizing effect. The ensemble dove into Ted Goldman’s “Tilk” — a delightful mash-up of classical, funk, jazz and Broadway-esque melodies — to bring the performance to an uplifting close.

NEWS from Young Concert Artists, Inc.

Emelyn Johnson and Daniel Ketter of Music in the American

Wild. (Blair Hornbuckle)

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