Lucia Hwong

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Lucia Hwong
Lucia Hwong and her Pipa.jpg
Lucia Hwong and her Pipa (a Chinese lute), January 2012
Born
OccupationComposer
Parent

Lucia Hwong is an American composer and instrumentalist. She has created music for theater, film, television, [1] dance and the concert stage. [2]

Contents

Biography

Hwong was born in Hawaii and raised in Los Angeles, California. Her grandmother was a grande dame of Chinese opera and her mother is international actress Lisa Lu. Her first public performance was in concert, playing the pipa, an ancient Chinese lute, at the age of six. She studied ethnomusicology, theater and dance at UCLA and Columbia University from 1978 to 1982, graduating with a B.A. degree cum laude in ethnomusicology.

She has chaired philanthropic events for organizations including the Women's Project, [3] American Theatre Wing, [4] Asia Society and Parrish Art Museum [5] and has been on committees such as Southampton Hospital. [6]

She was married to investment banker Peter Gordon (1942-2020), with whom she had two daughters. [7] [8]

Compositions

Her music for theater includes the scores for the Tony Award-winning Broadway production of M. Butterfly and Tony-nominated Golden Child ; as well as David Henry Hwang's New York Shakespeare Festival presentations of Sound and Beauty and The Dance and the Railroad and the Obie Award-winner FOB . [9] She composed the music for Iago and Venus Voodoo at Lincoln Center.

Hwong also scored the Mark Taper and McCarter Theatre premieres of Anna Deavere Smith's Twilight: Los Angeles 1992 [10] and created a 12-tone fugue for Joyce Carol Oates' The Perfectionist. [11] Among her dance scores, Fierce Attachments debuted at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival. [12] She also scored Ali MacGraw's Yoga Mindbody and created music for the Guggenheim Museum's Soho video wall.

Her music for television and film include Hiroshima (NBC), Vietnam War Story (HBO), Forbidden Nights (Tiananmen Square massacre) (ABC), Paper Angels (Angel Island) (PBS), Jennifer's in Jail (girl gangs) (Lifetime), Lotus (women's emancipation in China) (AFI), [13] Who Killed Vincent Chin? (racial murder) (1998 Oscar nomination: Best Documentary) and Silverlake Life: the View from Here (AIDS), honored with Sundance Film Festival and Peabody awards.

Concert pieces include The Unwelcome and Rhythm of Your Pulse, commissioned and performed by the Women's Philharmonic.

Her two albums, House of Sleeping Beauties and Secret Luminescence were released on the Private Music label. The Goddess Trilogy CDs of new-age music were released on her own label, Goddess Music, and received a Visionary Award in 2000.

Discography

The works of Lucia Hwong

THEATER1998 Golden child Composer, Incidental MusicBroadway New York
1993 Twilight :Los Angeles 1992 Composer, Arranger, PerformerMcCarter Theater, Princeton, NJ
1993 THE PERFECTIONIST Composer, Arranger, PerformerMcCarter Theater, Princeton, NJ
1993 TWILIGHT:LOS ANGELES 1993 Composer, Arranger, PerformerThe Mark Taper Forum, Los Angeles Music Center
1993 SNAKE IN THE VEIN Composer, Arranger, PerformerBlank Theatre Company, New York, NY
1993THE PERFECTIONISTComposer, Arranger, PerformerMcCarter Theater, Princeton, NJ
1992THE BIG ONE SHOTComposer, PerformerNaked Angels Theatre, New York, NY
1989VENUS VOODOOComposer, Arranger, PerformerLincoln Center, New York, NY
1989 M. Butterfly Composer, ArrangerWestbury Theatre, London
1988 M. Butterfly Composer, arranger, On-Stage Music DirectorO'Neill Theatre, Broadway New York
1983 SOUND AND BEAUTY Composer, Arranger, PerformerNew York Shakespeare Festival
1981 THE DANCE AND THE RAILROAD Composer, Music Director, PerformerNew York Shakespeare Festival
1980 F.O.B. Composer, Music Director, PerformerNew York Shakespeare Festival
1980IAGOComposer, Played DesdemonaMitzi Newhouse Theater - Lincoln Center (NY);
1979IAGOComposer, Played DesdemonaInner City Cultural Center (LA)
FILM2010GIVING BACKMusic ScoreGiving Back Foundation
1999 THE VENICE PROJECT Musician
1993 SILVERLAKE LIFE:THE VIEW FROM HERE Composer : ScoreSundance Film Festival
1988 LAWLESS LAND Composer : ScoreRoger Corman
1988LOTUSActress
1987 Who killed Vincent Chin? Composer : Score
1987 CHINA GIRL Composer : SongVestron
1987 THE LAST EMPEROR Actress: Featured Role Lady of the Book
1985 YEAR OF THE DRAGON Composer : Title Music
1984 NOTHING LASTS FOREVER Actress : Lunar Maiden
1982 HAMMETT Musician : Pipa; Chinese music consultant to John Barry
TELEVISION1993THE WORLD OF LUCIA HWONGComposer : ScoreTime Warner Cable
1991 JENNIFER’S IN JAIL Composer : ScoreLifetime
1990 Hiroshima: Out of the Ashes Composer : ScoreNBC
1990 FORBIDDEN NIGHTS Composer : ScoreCBS
1989 VIETNAM WAR STORY : THE LAST DAYS Composer : ScoreHBO / The Last Soldier
1985PAPER ANGELSComposer : ScorePBS/AMERICAN PLAYHOUSE
CONCERTS1996DRUM SONGComposer-Lyrics by George C. WolfeBoys Choir of Harlem
1991THE UNWELCOME RHYTHM OF YOUR PULSEComposerWomen’s Philharmonic San Francisco
1989VENUS VOODOOCreator, Composer, PerformerLincoln Center
DANCE & MULTI MEDIA1995 AKASHIC WEEKEND Pipa performerEvent of Ira Cohen
1994 ALI MACGRAW YOGA MIND & BODY Composer : ScoreM32 Music Co.
1987FIERCE ATTACHMENTSComposer : ScoreBAM/Next Wave Festival
RECORDING1999GODDESS MYSTICAL VISIONS Vol.3Composer, arranger, performerM32 Music Co.
1998GODDESS CELESTIAL REALMS VISIONS Vol.2Composer, arranger, performerM32 Music Co.
1998GODDESS AWAKENING VISIONS Vol.1Composer, arranger, performerM32 Music Co.
1994NEUROTRANSMITTER BATHComposerM32 Music Co.
1987SECRET LUMINESCENCEComposer, arranger, performerProduced by Kurt Munkacsi
1987NEO GEOPipa performerAlbum of Ryuichi Sakamoto
1984HOUSE OF SLEEPING BEAUTIESComposer, arranger, performerPrivate Music

Recognition

In 1978, Hwong received a Citation of Outstanding Contribution by the Board of Public Works of the City of Los Angeles. Time magazine (September 1986) and The New York Times (May 1986) included her in a list of America's exceptional new composers; and in 1993, she received the first Asian American Arts award from the Asian American Arts Alliance as Artist of the Year.

Composer Philip Glass wrote, "a young generation of composers has begun to appear. And the thing which distinguishes them...is that they represent...dual tradition...perhaps really for the first time, or something new. Not a borrowing from one tradition or incorporating the sounds of another, but a real blending of Eastern and Western music. Lucia Hwong is such a composer." [14]

Hwong is on the Board of The Women's Project and was honored at its Women of Achievement Awards on March 2, 2009. [15] Mayor Bloomberg declared the day "Women's Project Day" by Proclamation. Lucia has chaired the 21st, [16] 22nd [17] and 23rd [18] Women's Project Galas.

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