Fusion of Chinese and Western Musical Styles in Chen Yi’s from the Path of Beauty

Chen Yi (b.1953), one of the leading Chinese-born American composers today, has earned a reputation in the world as a female composer of contemporary music. Both Chinese and Western musical styles have influenced Chen’s compositional style. As one of the new-wave movement composers, Chen has blended Chinese musical ideas into contemporary Western compositions, to develop a fusion of Chinese and Western musical styles. This paper will discuss how Chen’s personal life experiences have impacted her compositional philosophy by drawing from her personal interviews. An overview of Chen’s compositions shows how her perspectives on her Chinese identity and her inspirations from Chinese culture influenced her personal compositional style. My analysis of From the Path of Beauty will investigate how she applies her compositional philosophy, and how she incorporates her own interpretation of Chinese culture in this work.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Musical Arts

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Music

Grantor

University of Houston

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• Xu, Jingwen

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Snyder, John L.

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Smith, Rob
• Koozin, Timothy
• Yon, Kirsten A.

• Yi, Chen
• String quartets
• Chinese and Western

Statement dc:rights

• The author of this work is the copyright owner. UH Libraries and the Texas Digital Library have their permission to store and provide access to this work. Further transmission, reproduction, or presentation of this work is prohibited except with permission of the author(s).

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10657/4469

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uh-ir.tdl.org:10657/4469