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About Huang Ruo:
Recently awarded First Prize by the prestigious Luxembourg International Composition Prize, Huang Ruo has been cited by the New Yorker as “one of the most intriguing of the new crop of Asian-American composers.” His vibrant and inventive musical voice draws equal inspiration from Chinese folk, Western avant-garde, rock, and jazz to create a seamless, organic integration using a compositional technique he calls “dimensionalism.” Huang Ruo’s writing spans from orchestra, chamber music, opera, theater, and modern dance, to sound installation, multi-media, experimental improvisation, folk rock, and film. Ensembles who have premiered and performed his music include the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Seattle Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic, New York City Opera Orchestra and Chorus, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Asko Ensemble, Nieuw Ensemble, Quatuor Diotima, Dutch Vocal Laboratory, and the Tang Quartet, and under conductors such as Wolfgang Sawallisch, James Conlon, Dennis Russell Davies, Ed Spanjaard, Xian Zhang, and Ilan Volkov. Huang Ruo has received awards and grants from the ASCAP Foundation, Presser Foundation, Jerome Foundation, Argosy Foundation, Greenwall Foundation, Meet The Composer, NYSCA, Chamber Music America, American Music Center, Aaron Copland Award, and Alice M. Ditson Award. Huang Ruo has collaborated with New York City Ballet’s principal dancer Damian Woetzel and choreographer Christopher Wheeldon, in addition to kinetic painter Norman Perryman. In 2003, Miller Theatre featured Huang Ruo on its Composer Portraits series, where his four chamber concertos were premiered as a cycle with him conducting. New York Times critic Allan Kozinn listed this concert as the second on the list of his “Top Ten Classical Moments of 2003.” Huang Ruo’sChamber Concerto Cycle was released on Naxos in February 2007; Leaving Sao, a work for orchestra and Chinese Folk Voice, was released on Albany Records with his own singing in 2008; and Divergence came out on Koch International in 2009. Huang Ruo's latest CD To The Four Corners, performed by Future In REverse, was recently released on NaxosRecords. Huang Ruo’s film credits include soundtracks for I.M. Pei Building China Modern, Jian-Fu Garden and Stand Up. The former was recently screened nationwide on PBS Channel, and the latter was named the Official Selection for the Rhode Island International Film Festival and the Atlanta International Film Festival. Aside from being an avant-garde composer, he is also a conductor and Chinese folk-rock singer, releasing commercial recordings on Naxos and Albany Records, and making debuts at Lincoln Center as well as Carnegie hall. Also noted as an author, Huang Ruo published Selection of Classic Chinese Folk Songs with the Zhong Shan University Press. His music is published by the Huang Ruo Publishing and Recording Company, which he founded in 2000. Huang Ruo has been an invited lecturer and forum presenter at New York University, Columbia University, Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, Shanghai Conservatory of Music, and Guangzhou Conservatory of Music. He was also a visiting composer at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the University of Georgia. Huang Ruo was born in Hainan Island, China, in 1976, the year the Chinese Cultural Revolution ended. His father, who is a well-known composer in China, began teaching him composition and piano when he was six years old. Growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, when China was steadily opening its gates to the Western world, he received both traditional and Western education at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. He was admitted into its composition program, studying with Deng Erbo at the age of twelve. As a result of the dramatic cultural and economic changes in China following the Cultural Revolution, his education expanded from Bach, Mozart, Stravinsky, and Lutoslawski, to include the Beatles, rock and roll, heavy metal, and jazz. Huang Ruo was able to absorb all of these newly allowed Western influences without inhibiting factors. As a member of the new generation of Chinese composers, he clearly knows that his goal and task is not just to mix both Western and Eastern elements, but to go beyond that to create a seamless integration and a convincing organic unity, drawing influences from various genres and cultures. After winning the Henry Mancini Award at the 1995 International Film and Music Festival in Switzerland, he moved to the United States to further his education. Since then, he has earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in composition from the Juilliard School. His composition teachers have included Randolph Coleman and Samuel Adler. Huang Ruo is currently a member of the composition faculty at SUNY Purchase. He is the artistic director and conductor of Future In REverse (FIRE), and was selected as a Young Leader Fellow by the National Committee on United States–China Relations in 2006. For more information about Huang Ruo and his music, please visit: www.huangruo.com

Future In REverse (FIRE) is dedicated to the future of music. Specializing in multi-media and cross-genre projects, ensemble FIRE is widely praised for its innovative programming and performances. Founded in 2005 by composer and conductor Huang Ruo, FIRE has performed at Lincoln Center, Time Warner Center, Rubin Museum of Arts, Austrian Cultural Forum NY, Issue Project Room, Aspen Summer Music Festival, and the Greenwich Music Festival. FIRE's diverse collaborations include visual music with kinetic painter Norman Perryman and ballets with choreographers James Sewell from the James Sewell Ballet and Charlotte Griffin from the New York Choreographic Institute. In 2008, FIRE recorded sound tracks for two films (Emperor's New Garden and Stand Up), which will be released in 2010. FIRE's upcoming recording TO THE FOUR CORNERS will be released Naxos Record in 2009. Comprised of both Eastern and Western instruments and some of today's most gifted and promising young musicians, FIRE advocates music in a wide variety of styles, ranging from avant-garde modernism to world music, visual arts, and experimental music. For more information about FIRE, please visit: www.myspace.com/futureinreverse

The Momenta Quartet has been described by Time Out New York as a “striking new-music quartet.” Perhaps what is most striking about the quartet, however, is that it is much more than that. Along with over 40 world premieres by both established and up-and-coming composers, the ensemble’s repertoire includes classical standards, contemporary masterworks and consort music of the Renaissance. Momenta approaches all of this music with equal passion and commitment; a new work by a young composer is given as much attention as a revered mainstay of the classical canon. Some of these emerging composers have received important grants, Rhodes scholarships, invitations to Darmstadt and commercial recording contracts as a direct result of their work with the quartet. In February 2009, Momenta was one of only seven recipients of the prestigious Koussevitzky Music Fund grant to commission a new work by the Malaysian composer Kee Yong Chong, and in 2011 won a second grant for Bolivian composer Agustín Fernández.

This impressive track record accounts for Momenta’s growing reputation among composers and composition faculty. Currently in its sixth year of residency at Temple University, the quartet has also performed and lectured at Cornell, Columbia and Yeshiva Universities; Haverford, Swarthmore and Bryn Mawr Colleges; the Boston and Brooklyn Conservatories; Mannes School of Music; and the Princeton Institute for Advanced Studies, among others. Beyond the academy, Momenta has made its mark through thoughtful and innovative concert programs at Americas Society; Symphony Space; Barge Music; the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture and the Austrian Cultural Forum; and at some of New York’s more alternative venues such as the Stone, Issue Project Room, Roulette Intermedium, and Tonic.

The Momenta Quartet has recorded for Centaur Records, Furious Artisans and MRS Classics, has been broadcast on WQXR and has performed internationally in Indonesia, Singapore and the United Kingdom. The Momenta Quartet’s 2010/11 season is made possible in part through the generous support of the Aaron Copland Fund for Music. Momenta’s 2011 New York concerts are made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, celebrating 50 years of building strong, creative communities in New York State’s 62 counties.

Fang Tao Jiang, soprano, was the only singer chosen to represent China at the IHS International Music Festival in Atlanta, Georgia. Soon after, the young soprano made her debut at Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall as soprano soloist in John Rutter's Requiem. Since then, Ms. Jiang has traveled throughout the United States, Europe and Asia, performing many solo recitals and concerts. A winner of Bellini International Vocal Competition, she was featured as the 2006 Promising Young Talent at the International Opera Alliance. Recent concert highlights include soprano solo Frühlingsstimmen in concerts with Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra at Cincinnati Music Hall; Solo appearance in Mozart's Exsultate Jubilate at Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center; soprano solo in Carmina Burana with Hunter Symphony; Soloist with Utah Festival Opera Orchestra and solo recitals at Weill Hall, Carnegie Hall; Merkin Hall, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Symphony Space; and a concert tour in China. From Amalfi Music Festival in Italy to Utah Festival Opera, Miss Jiang has earned her signature operatic role Susanna from Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro. Critics have acclaimed, “ There is gold in her voice!”(Amalfi Coast Daily); “Her rendition brought the house down ” (Michael Ballam, Artistic Director, Utah Festival Opera). Other performed roles include Zerlina, Nanetta, Rosina, Juliet, Gilda with Michigan Opera Company, Opera Rome, Italy; Nice Opera Festival, France, AOTC Productions; Lanxin Theater Productions; CUNY Productions; She is featured as the leading role Concepcion in Ravel’s L’Heure Espagnole and will tour the production in Southeastern Asia and Southern France in 2010-2012 season. Her future concert engagements include solo recitals in Hongkong, China; Vienna, Austria; Sidney, Australia; Ireland and France. Miss Jiang’s interest in new music made her a sought after concert artist. In 2008, her world premier of work by award-winning composer Huang Ruo at The Library of Congress was raved by Xinhua News and was broadcasted by CCTV. The two artists' collaboration will be continued on a new album under Naxos record label. In the same year, Ms. Jiang was featured as soprano solo on American National classical music radiothon WQXR FM 96.3 and followed by her New York premier of Chinese folk songs arranged by composer Zhou Long. Miss Jiang was featured in events such as the acceptance concert for the Host of the 2008 Olympic Games; concerts at Harvard Club, National Arts Club, Austrian Cultural Forum, Asia Society and the United Nations. She is active contributing her art for charitable causes. Since winning a singing competition at age 14 in China, Ms. Jiang has received linguistic, musical and vocal training from Shanghai Conservatory of Music, Hunter College, The Juilliard School and Renata Scotto Opera Academy. For more info, please visit www.fangtaojiang.com

Laurence completed several engagements with the New York City Opera, including La Fanciulla del West, Of Mice and Men, L’Etoile, The Capulets and the Montagues, The Barber of Seville (Touring), and Ariodante. Also, he has performed with the Sarasota Opera in Falstaff, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Oberto Conte di San Bonifacio, and scenes from La Boheme, Un Ballo in Maschera, and La Rondine, and the Utah Festival Opera in Susannah, Naughty Marietta, and South Pacific. He has appeared as the featured soloist in numerous concerts including the award-winning television concert Idol Tiers, and has toured Europe and the Middle East. He is also an accomplished organist, pianist, and choral conductor. Laurence was awarded grants from both The Schuyler Foundation for Careerbridges, and the Sergio Franchi Foundation. Laurence is in demand as a concert performer, including featured soloist engagements with the Ravello Music Festival, in Ravello Italy, the Westchester Arts Council, the National Arts Council, the Rich Forum in “A Night at the Opera,” and Opera Ischia in Ischia, Italy. He was a featured soloist in a Careerbridges production with the Pueblo Symphony in Colorado, and with the Sergio Franchi Memorial Concert. Laurence traveled to Tirana, Albania to perform in the Maria Kraja Vocal Festival and Memorial Concert, which was televised throughout Europe. Also, he performed in the CBS produced television show “Who Wants to Be an Opera Star,” in which featured an appearance at Symphony Space in New York. He sang the tenor solo in Schubert’s Mass in E-flat major with the St. Cecilia Orchestra and Chorus. In May 2010, Laurence made his Carnegie Hall debut as the tenor soloist in Bach’s Mass in B-minor, and returned to Carnegie Hall in April of 2011, as the tenor soloist in Mozart’s Requiem. Laurence’s upcoming performances include the tenor soloist for Handel’s Chandos Anthems, and Rodolfo in La Boheme with the New Amsterdam Symphony.