Ying Wang

“I live and form my identity as a contemporary composer from China with a keen and critical eye on the entanglements of politics, culture, society and technology and their consequences. I am looking for a contrasting and multishaped combination of my three major tools: the traditional instruments of the European music and their extended techniques, the critical examination of my Chinese heritage and the current possibilities of electronics. In my music I transform the world of today, its crises and tragedies, as well as its beauty and diversity – there is both screaming criticism and delightful admiration for this world in my music.” Ying WANG  王颖

Ying Wang's compositions can be described as sonorous, dramatic, and distinctive. The contrasts and ruptures in her birthplace in Shanghai as well as in her new home in Berlin are not only musically reflected in her works. Time and again, she takes up social themes such as environmental pollution, global social grievances, political persecution, or the relationship between man and technology. In her work, she constantly seeks new points of contact with other media and arts such as dance, video, digital art, light, visual art, and performance. 

A number of highly acclaimed works were premiered in the past season. At the Ultraschall Berlin festival in early 2023, the composer was represented with the world premiere of 528Hz 8va for orchestra and Mini-Moog. This extended version of the composition 528hz for orchestra, premiered in Essen in 2021 – optimistic and powerful music that deliberately avoids dramatic contrasts – was premiered by the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin under Karen Kamensek. Last bit..., premiered by Ensemble Reflektor under Holly Hyun Choe at Podium Esslingen, deals with the relationship between AI and human thought. Shortly afterwards, the AsianArt Ensemble premièred EMULsonic for koto and quartet at Konzerthaus Berlin. Contemporary poems by Chinese poets served as the basis for five intermezzi entitled Of Detours and Updates, which were also commissioned by KlangForum Heidelberg in spring 2023 and performed between the six movements of Mahler's Lied von der Erde. As a scholarship holder of the Bamberg Villa Concordia, Ying Wang realised a portrait concert, among other things. For the Beijing Music Festival 2023, she composed Big BANG! – at the moment of cosmic inception for chamber orchestra. In 2024, Desire – Venus counsels RealDoll for soprano, piano and iPad was premiered at the Kissinger Sommer song workshop; the new composition Cosmic static. Deep listening with Bruckner was performed as part of the Bruckner.lab at Podium Esslingen. New works in 2024 also include Virulent for flutist Erik Drescher, Grey Hair for video, four voices and four instruments for KlangForum Heidelberg, Cassandra Argues with siri (new version, Kassandra - choose the truth) and Frequenz Ludwig for chamber orchestra. 

Ying Wang has worked with numerous orchestras in Europe and Asia, including the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern, Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra, ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna and SWR Symphony Orchestra. Her works have been performed under the direction of conductors such as Marin Alsop, Markus Stenz, Brad Lubman, Johannes Kalitzke, Gregor Mayrhofer, Julien Leroy, and Marcus Creed. She has cooperated with ensembles such as Klangforum Wien, Ensemble Resonanz, Quatuor Diotima, Phoenix Basel, the ensemble of the International Ensemble Modern Academy, Musica Assoluta, Lucerne Festival Ensemble, Mosaik Ensemble, MAM.Manufaktur für aktuelle Musik, Ensemble PHACE, and Ensemble Kontrapunkte.

Ying Wang has been awarded numerous prizes and scholarships for her work. Among others, she received the production prize of the Giga Hertz Prize and the composition prize of the 5th Brandenburg Biennale in 2013, the IRINO PRIZE for chamber orchestra in Tokyo in 2014, and the Heidelberg Female Artist Prize in 2017. The portrait CD Tun Tu was released in 2017 on the Wergo label.

Ying Wang began her composition training at the conservatory in her home city of Shanghai before postgraduate studies took her to Germany in 2003. Her teachers at the Cologne University of Music and Dance included York Höller, Michael Beil, Rebecca Saunders, and Johannes Schöllhorn.  In 2010 she completed her studies in contemporary music at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts on a scholarship from the International Ensemble Modern Academy (IEMA). Ying Wang took part in the Cursus de Composition et d'informatique musicale/Ircam Paris in 2012. She has been teaching composition at the Shanghai Conservatory since 2013.

Season 2024/25

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