JUNO Award-winning composer Vivian Fung has a unique talent for combining idiosyncratic textures and styles into large-scale works, reflecting her multicultural background. Her work often assimilates disparate influences such as non-Western folk music, Brazilian rhythms, and visual inspirations.
During the 2017-18 season, Fung’s Humanoid for solo cello and electronics premiered in New Orleans and toured to Vancouver, New York, Philadelphia, Toronto, Ottawa, and the Bay Area. The San José Chamber Orchestra recently premiered Baroque Melting, which received its Canadian premiere in April 2018 with the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra. Fung’s Clarinet Quintet: Frenetic Memories premiered at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center to critical acclaim and travels to Philadelphia Chamber Music Society and Chamber Music Northwest. Additional commissions include Earworms for Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra; a new solo percussion work for internationally renowned percussionist Aiyun Huang, commissioned by the Banff Centre; and a new piano quartet for Ensemble Made in Canada’s Mosaïque Project.
Highlights of Fung’s numerous recent high-profile projects include her Violin Concerto No. 2, commissioned and premiered in 2015 by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and violinist Jonathan Crow; and Biennale Snapshots, an orchestral work which opened the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s 2015-16 season. Many distinguished artists and ensembles around the world have embraced Fung’s music as part of the core repertoire, including the Winnipeg New Music Festival, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Milwaukee Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Staatskapelle Karlsruhe, Suwon Chorale of South Korea, Metropolis Ensemble, and American String Quartet, among others.
In 2012, Naxos Canadian Classics released a recording of Fung’s Violin Concerto [No.1], Piano Concerto: Dreamscapes, and Glimpses. The Violin Concerto earned Fung the 2013 JUNO Award for “Classical Composition of the Year.” Several of Fung’s other works have been released commercially on the Telarc, Çedille, Innova, and Signpost labels.
Born in Edmonton, Canada, Fung received her doctorate from The Juilliard School in New York. She currently lives in California and is on the faculty of Santa Clara University.
Fung makes her Festival debut with the West Coast premiere of Dust Devils on Saturday, August 4, during the After Dixieland concert.
