The Sound Within: The Musical Voice of Eun Young Lee

Eun Young Lee - Composer

Composition, for Lee, is like “cooking without a recipe: the ingredients may be familiar, but the result is always new.” Eun Young Lee

Beginnings in Sound and Improvisation

Eun Young Lee never intended to become a composer. As a child, she simply loved to improvise at the piano, delighting in the freedom of sound rather than the structure of written music. Her musical journey began not with formal lessons but through the simple joy of pressing keys, exploring tone, texture, and rhythm. Her first piano teacher, Nam-Ok Lee, played a pivotal role in nurturing this instinctual curiosity, encouraging young Eun Young to engage with the instrument as a means of expression rather than mere execution. It was her mother, however, who first recognized that improvisation was more than play, it was composition in its earliest, most organic form. She encouraged Eun Young to pursue formal studies, believing that her daughter had something important to say through music.

Academic Foundation and First Compositions

After studying harmony and theory privately with Namkung DukEun, Eun Young Lee entered Ewha Womans University in Korea, where she majored in composition theory. Her academic work there focused on the fundamentals: harmony, counterpoint, and music analysis. Her musical language continued to develop in tandem with her understanding of structure, but her heart still leaned toward spontaneity. Upon completing her master’s degree in music theory, she began teaching in Korea and working closely with church singers, arranging and orchestrating music for services. These early experiences gave her a deep understanding of the collaborative nature of music and the importance of writing for the human voice.

A Turning Point in Korea

While teaching at the National University in Jeju Island in Korea, a pivotal moment reshaped her artistic path. Moved by the curiosity of one of her students, she composed her first piece for violin. Hearing it performed for the first time awakened a new clarity within her, a realization that composition was not merely a spontaneous act, but a calling to be pursued with intention. It was there, amid the quiet of the island and the spark of a student’s interest, that she consciously embraced the identity of composer.
Her journey, like many artists’, included periods of reflection and redirection. Encouraged by family to build a life of balance and stability, she later moved to the United States, where her personal and artistic life began to blossom in full. Though her father passed before witnessing the full flowering of her career, the foundation he helped lay remains an enduring part of her story a quiet strength that continues to guide her work.

Style, Process, and Philosophy

Lee’s compositional voice resists simple definition. Rooted in both Korean folk sensibilities and contemporary Western idioms, her music reflects a broad, deeply personal palette. One of her formative influences was American avant-garde composer George Crumb, whose expansive use of timbre and expressive nuance illuminated for her the limitless potential of sound. Through his example, she discovered music as an inner language, intimate, fluid, and expansive.

Rather than following trends or adhering to rigid stylistic categories, Lee approaches each work with a focus on the integrity of pitch, sonority, and craftsmanship. For her, composition begins with both a structural rigor and a reflective question: What gives this piece meaning? It is not simply about expression, but about construction, about shaping each note with intention, discipline, and emotional clarity. Her music often unfolds from this dual foundation: the emotional impulse to communicate and the technical mastery to do so with depth and precision

Listening and Letting Music Lead

Her process is deeply reflective. Often, she begins by jotting down fragments, a few notes, sounds, gestures, until the underlying motive of the piece reveals itself. From there, she sculpts and listens. Listening, in fact, is central to her philosophy. She listens to the music, to her intuition, to performers, and to the audience. She believes music is a living dialogue, not a fixed statement. Composition, for Lee, is like cooking without a recipe: the ingredients may be familiar, but the result is always new. Each work is built from the raw material of sound, emotion, and memory, delicately balanced between structure and spontaneity.

Improvisation and Evolution

This tension between form and freedom continues to define her work. As a trained composer, she now sees the distinction between improvisation and composition more clearly. Improvisation, once the core of her practice, now serves as the spark that ignites a more deliberate and crafted compositional process. Still, that improvisatory spirit, intuitive, free, alive, is always present in her music. She likens her creative process to planting a seed and allowing it to grow in unexpected directions, rather than forcing it into a predetermined shape.

Challenges, Teaching, and Advocacy

Lee has also experienced firsthand the limitations placed on composers by age. Many institutional opportunities cater to artists under 30, creating an arbitrary threshold that excludes countless voices with wisdom and experience. She believes strongly that music must transcend such constraints, and that opportunity should be tied to vision, not age. In her teaching and advocacy, she pushes for broader inclusivity in the classical music world.

Another cornerstone of her philosophy is musical literacy. She believes that students must be exposed to a wide range of styles and traditions, but that exposure must be grounded in solid musicianship. Harmony, counterpoint, aural skills, and historical awareness are, to her, the soil in which artistic individuality grows. Her teaching reflects this: rigorous, yet always rooted in creativity.

International Recognition and Performances

Lee's music has reached audiences across continents. Her works have been performed in major festivals and concert halls around the world, including Prague, London, Brazil, Switzerland, and throughout the United States and Korea. She has written for ensembles such as eighth blackbird, New York New Music Ensemble, Pacifica String Quartet, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Momenta Quartet, Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, ALEA III, and ECCE. She is also a recipient of the prestigious Aaron Copland House Residency. Her honors include the 2023 Guggenheim Fellowship, the Tsang-Houei Hsu International Composition Award, the Max Di Julio Prize, and multiple SCI/ASCAP awards.

Personal Triumphs and Future Visions

Yet despite the accolades, she remains grounded. Her most cherished performance was not the most prestigious, but the most personal: a rendition of her piece A quiet way. Through that work, she learned to advocate for her ideas and embrace the full vulnerability of being heard. It helped her step into her voice.

Looking ahead, Lee hopes to compose a major work for full orchestra and chorus, uniting her passion for vocal expression with her orchestral imagination. A lifelong choral singer, she believes deeply in the power of collective sound to build empathy and community.

Her recent project, the Peace Project series, explores themes of unity, cultural dialogue, and shared humanity through music. Each installment engages diverse ensembles and traditions to foster connection and healing through sound.

Peace Project 1, Pax Aeterna, is a contemplative work for bassoon and string quartet, written for Adrian Morejon and the Momenta Quartet.
Peace Project 2, ONNURI, features works by seven composers for seven instrumentalists, highlighting collaborative spirit and musical diversity.
Peace Project 3, Han Madang, brings together voice and five Korean traditional instruments in a celebration of cultural heritage and communal gathering.

For Lee, music is not merely an artform, it is a human bridge.

Music for the Listener

She prefers not to explain her music through program notes, believing that listeners should experience the work in their own way. "Everyone in the audience is at a different stage in their life," she says, "and they will hear the piece through the lens of their own experience." This respect for the listener, for their individuality and imagination, is part of what makes her music so resonant.

Legacy and Listening

As an educator, mentor, and artist, Eun Young Lee composes not only to build bridges between East and West but also to connect diverse societies and countries through the universal language of music. Her artistic activity serves as a conduit between tradition and innovation, sound and silence, creating spaces where cultural boundaries dissolve. Her ultimate aspiration is to make a profound contribution to Korean culture while fostering a more unified global artistic community.

In a world often marked by division, she believes music possesses a unique power to transcend differences, conveying what words cannot, and reminding us that beauty emerges from attentive listening. Eun Young Lee composes not to impress but to express; she listens deeply so that we may do the same. Through her music, she invites audiences to embrace empathy and understanding.

Continuing her dedication to advocacy, representation, and community in the arts, she recently joined the Board of Directors at Vox Feminarum Corp.