Chengjin Koh | The Saad Haddad Show

Winner of the 2022 BMI Student Composer Award (William Schuman Prize) and ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award, KOH Cheng Jin is a Singaporean composer, Yang Qin and violin performer currently based in New York. Her music is eclectic and diverse in personalities. As a Chinese and Western trained musician, her works incorporate various influences from these worlds and reflect her passionate enthusiasm in unifying colorful music idioms. Her multiple accolades also include Mirror Visions Ensemble Prize, Society of New Music 2020 New York Federation of Music Clubs’ Brian Israel Prize, the Palmer Dixon and Gena Raps Chamber Music Prizes from the Juilliard School, as well as the Margaret Blackburn, John Eaton Memorial and Boston New Music Initiative Prizes. Her works have been performed at Singapore International Festival of Arts, Lincoln Center, National Sawdust, Yale-Norfolk New Music Workshop, Bowdoin International Music Festival, the National Flute Association Convention in San Diego, Australia Woodend Winter Arts Music Festival, Sidney Chapel (Cambridge, UK), China Conservatory Concert Hall, and the Esplanade, Victoria Concert and Singapore Conference Halls in Singapore. As a proficient Yang Qin musician who won the Singapore Chinese Music Competition (Open Category) with a solo debut with the Singapore Chinese Orchestra, Cheng Jin is indebted to her teachers Miss Qu Jian Qing and Miss Seah Poh Chun, as well as Dr. Kelly Tang, who was her first mentor in Composition at School of the Arts Singapore (SOTA). She is also grateful to her pedagogues at The Juilliard School, Robert Beaser and Melinda Wagner, both who were instrumental in her pursuit of Bachelor’s (Hons) and Master’s degrees in Music Composition generously supported by Singapore’s Loke Cheng Kim Foundation. She was also honored to be the Teaching Fellow for Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program (Composition) for two years and its Evening Division (Music Theory). She is currently a member of the Composers’ Society of Singapore (CSS) and developing her musical, research and educational interests as a MacCracken PhD Fellow and Teaching Assistant at New York University (College of Arts and Science).

🌐 https://www.kohchengjin.com/

💿 ”Before Daybreak,” for solo violin:    • Before Daybreak 《孤燈挑盡》for solo violin (202...  

💿 ”Mountain of Echoing Halls,” for yangqin and string quartet:    • Mountain of Echoing Halls for yangqin and ...  

💿 ”醉荡步,” for gaunzi/sunoa, erhu, ruan, and guzheng:    • 醉荡步, by Koh Cheng Jin | CSS Score Follower...  

🕒 Timestamps

00:55 Juilliard
06:25 “Before Daybreak,” for solo violin
12:18 Notation in “Before Daybreak”
19:30 NYU
27:40 “Mountain of Echoing Halls,” for yangqin and string quartet
38:30 Non-Western instruments
49:43 ”醉荡步,” for gaunzi/sunoa, erhu, ruan, and guzheng