Seoul-born Chicago based composer, educator, and researcher Dongryul Lee (이동렬, Korean pronunciation: [iː doŋ ɾjəɾ]) seeks to write music that is deeply oriented around the acoustical nature of sounds and the playfulness of classical performance practice, to create profound aural experiences with both dramaturgy and pathos. He finds inspirations in spiritual, literary, and scientific elements, encompassing a diverse range of topics from Borgesian poetics to Number Theory.
He was awarded the Kate Neal Kinley Memorial Fellowship, which supported his study with Jukka Tiensuu (2020); the third prize in the first Bartók World Competition (Hungary, 2018); the Special Prize Piero Pezzé in the Composition Competition Città di Udine (Italy, 2018); Second Prize in the 3rd GMCL Competition (Portugal, 2017); and Second Prize in 2017 Busan Maru International Music Festival Competition (South Korea). The performance of his Unending Rose by the Kairos quartett (Berlin, 2020) was supported by the Theodore Presser Foundation, Arts Council Korea, Kultur Büro Elisabeth Berlin, and Ministry of Culture of the Land Brandenburg. His compositions have been performed by ensembles such as the Avanti!, Grossman, Kairos, Contemporanea, Jupiter, MIVOS, Callithumpian Consort, Axiom Brass, GMCL, S.E.M., Conference Ensemble, Paramirabo, Cello Loft, and Illinois Modern Ensemble, among others. His Parastrata has been performed in four different cities in Europe and North America, and his A finite island in the infinite ocean was premiered at the Fromm Players Concerts at Harvard by Miranda Cuckson in April 2021. His new pieces are commissioned by Grossman Ensemble (Chicago) and the Callithumpian Consort (Boston) to be premiered in 2021-22.
Lee was the 2020-21 CCCC Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Chicago’s Center for Contemporary Composition. He began music-making when he was 14 after spending countless hours transcribing all kinds of music with computer including game and animated film, and was largely self-taught thereafter until his early twenties. Dongryul finally came to the US in 2008 to study at the Eastman School (BM in composition) as a 29 year old freshman, after earning a degree in computer science (BS) from Yonsei University and studying music and practicing piano privately for five years while working as a software engineer. He completed his MM and DMA degrees in composition-theory at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he taught classes and administered the McFarland Carillon. While at Eastman, he received four awards for his compositions and achievements. His dissertation research on virtual bells realized by using the Finite Element Method was presented at the IRCAM Forum Workshop in Montreal in February 2021. Dongryul currently teaches music at North Central College as an adjunct associate professor of music.