Jon Yu is a Taiwanese American composer whose music explores notions of ritual, utility, and excess. His recent works focus on sculptural elements in electroacoustic instrumental music.
His music has been performed internationally by ensembles and soloists including Mivos Quartet, Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, loadbang, AuditivVokal Dresden, Earplay, AsianArt Ensemble, Duo Signal, haegeum player Soo Yeon Lyuh, and percussionist Oded Geizhals. His music has been presented at Darmstadt Ferienkurse, Pacific Rim Music Festival, Festival Musica, Festival Barcelona Modern, impuls Festival, outHEAR New Music Week, and IRCAM ManiFeste.
Yu was the recipient of the 2017 Mivos/Kanter Prize for his string quartet O reche modo, and was the laureate of the Prix Alain Baltes for his vocal sextet PEK TI. From 2018-19, he was in residence in Paris as a fellow of the George Ladd Prix de Paris. He returned to Paris in 2020-21 to study in the Cursus Program on Composition and Computer Music at IRCAM under Thierry De Mey.
He completed his Ph.D. in music composition at UC Berkeley, studying with Franck Bedrossian and Ken Ueno. He has also studied privately with Steven Kazuo Takasugi, Rebecca Saunders, and Pierluigi Billone.
At MacDowell, Yu worked on a new piece for solo prepared double bell trombone and electronics for Kevin Toksöz Fairbairn. The piece explores the liminal qualities of an instrumental sound sculpture. He also composed sections of a piece for ensemble and electronics for sfSound that will be premiered at the West Oakland Sound Series in Summer of 2025.
