• Biography

    Zhiyi Wang (b.1980) is a multi-award-winning composer for contemporary classical and film genres.

     

    Wang's composing characteristics reflect all the genres he has touched, with a sophisticated amalgam of Oriental tinctures, Western avant-garde, and classical traditions. He has written various music works in different genres, from contemporary classical, film and TV scores, modern ballet, and musicals to world music and pop music. His works have been performed by leading artists, including Yuri Bashmet, Sarah Brightman, Lang Lang, Li-Wei Qin, etc., as well as groups including the China National Symphony Orchestra, China Philharmonic, NCPA Orchestra, The Orchestra of China National Opera House, The Orchestra of Shanghai Opera House, Brno Philharmonic, China Broadcast Symphony Orchestra, Senzoku Gakuen New Philharmonic, Suzhou Symphony Orchestra, Lviv Chamber Orchestra, Eighth Blackbird, Moscow Soloists, Sound Ways Ensemble, Ensemble Les Amis, ConTempo Quartet, Baroque Camerata, Lemberg Sinfonietta, Villiers String Quartet and many others throughout Asia, North America, and Europe.

     

    As a core member of the music crew in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Wang composed various music programs for the Opening Ceremony. His Fanfare for the Ceremony was performed when Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee, and Liu Qi, President of the Beijing Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games, entered the stadium to make their opening speeches. His arrangements included four programs: the theme song, You and Me (performed by Sarah Brightman and Liu Huan), the duet song, Dream of the Five Rings, Ritual Music, and Lighting of the Olympic Cauldron. The Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee has officially acknowledged Wang's immense contribution to the spirit of the Ceremonies. He later transcribed the orchestral version of the Beijing Olympic Theme Song You and Me for the 2012 New Year's Concert at the China National Centre for the Performing Arts, which Lorin Maazel conducted. Wang was also an appointed composer for the 2019 Beijing International Horticultural Exhibitions Opening Ceremony.

     

    In the contemporary domain, Wang has won top prizes from Red Note International Composition Competition, International Alfred Schnittke Composition Competition, Senzoku Gakuen International Composition Competition, Malta International Composition Competition, International Franz Liszt Competition for Composers, International Sergei Slonimsky Composition Competition and International Antonín Dvořák Composition Competition. He was the recipient of the Grawemeyer Fellowship and has been Composer-in-Residence at the Shanghai Opera House, the National Sun Yat-sen University in Taiwan, Sacrarium International Composers' Forum in Ukraine, and the International Contemporary Arts Academy in Romania. He frequently receives commissions from various orchestras, festivals, and organizations. Starting in 2019, the Winter International Arts Festival in Sochi commissioned him to create new music for Yuri Bashmet and Moscow Soloists for every year's opening concert. Anna Kislitsyna performed his piano work, Etude for Concert, in Carnegie Hall in June 2022.

     

    Regarding film music, Wang worked with the most acclaimed film directors in China, including Kaige Chen, Yimou Zhang, and Hark Tsui. He composed an original score for the films But Always and Highway of Love, for which he received a nomination from the 15th World Soundtrack Awards. In 2017, he garnered the Gold Medal from the Global Music Awards for his original film score, Dali Holiday. In 2021, his score to The Guiding Star (segment from My People, My Country) was nominated for the Hollywood Music in Media Awards. His score for The Battle at Lake Changjin received the Outstanding Music Award from the 19th Huabiao Film Awards and the Best Original Music nomination from the 35th Golden Rooster Awards. The film became the second highest-grossing film in 2021 worldwide and the new champion of China's all-time box office. Moreover, he composed the original music and theme songs for TV series and documentaries, including Romantic Attachment for the documentary The Louvre Meets the Forbidden City, which is included in the music textbook for nationwide middle schools in China. His score for the documentary series Seal in Time received a nomination for Best Music Award from the 11th China Academy Awards for Documentary Film.

     

    In pop music, Wang received two nominations for Best Arranger in the 25th Golden Melody Awards for the album Li Jian Classic Remake Collections. He collaborated with famous singers from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea. He was involved in China's most popular singing reality shows, including I Am a Singer, Grammy Salute to China Star, and X-Factor, creating his version of classic songs.

     

    Originally from China, Wang holds BM and MM in music composition from Oberlin College Conservatory and the University of Louisville, where he studied with Randolph Coleman and Marc Satterwhite. Both institutions honored him with an Alumni Award. Wang is a member of The Recording Academy and World Soundtrack Academy, and he serves a jury at LIT Talent Awards and Wave Music Committee at Tencent. He lives in Los Angeles.

  • news

    Upcoming projects and events

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    Outstanding Music Award from the 19th Huabiao Film Awards

    Wang received the Outstanding Music Award for The Battle at Lake Changjin from the 19th Huabiao Film Awards. Huabiao is the highest honor in China's film industry.

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    Alumni Award

    Wang is the honoree of the 2023 Alumni Award from the University of Louisville.

    Producing a Pop album for singer Hong Ru

    The pop album containing all the songs written and produced by Zhiyi aims for release in 2024.

  • Works

    Music composed for various genres

    Film and TV Scores

    for a detailed list of works, please visit IMDb

    • Every Bastard Has A Sorrow, Original Film Score
    • The Man of Soccer, Original TV Series Score
    • Dali Holiday, Original Film Score
    • Highway of Love, Original Film Score
    • But Always, Original Film Score
    • The Flowers of War, Orchestration and Production of Film Score
    • Coming Home, Orchestration and Production of Film Score
    • Forbidden City 100, Original Documentary Score
    • Huai, the Open Door, Original Documentary Score
    • Jinling: Predestined to Buddha, Original Documentary Score
    • Spy Game in Ancient Soochow, Original TV Series Score
    • The Carven Flower Building, Original TV Series Score

    Orchestral

    • The Legend of Tiger Hill
    • The Vanishing River
    • The Aroma of Exotic
    • Color of Tears
    • Chrysalides

    Chamber

    • Maple in Twilight for Ensemble
    • Three Overlapping Sounds for String Quartet
    • Piano Trio for Violin, Violoncello and Piano
    • Three Art Songs for Soprano and Piano
    • Elegy for String Orchestra
    • Yue Wei Yang for Traditional Chinese Instruments Ensemble
    • Frailty for Tenor and Piano

    Solo

    • Etude for Concert for Piano
    • Melody of Autume for Piano
    • Variation for Piano
    • The Grand Canal for Piano
    • Sonata for Piano

    Songs

    • Home In Jiangsu, Theme Song of 1st Jiangsu Development Summit
    • Love Love Aloha, Theme Song of the Film I Love That Crazy Little Thing
    • The Man of Soccer, Theme Song of the TV Series The Man of Soccer
    • The Origin of Fates, Theme Song of the Documentary Jinling: Predestined to Buddha
    • Romantic Attachment, Theme Song of the Documentary The Louvre Meets the Forbidden City
    • The Sorrow from Wind and Rain, Theme Song of the TV Series Feng Yu Diao Hua Lou
    • The Echo of Strings, Theme Song of the TV Series Spy Game in Ancient Soochow

    2008 Beijing Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

    • Fanfare for the Ceremony, Original Composition
    • You and Me, (Official Theme Song of 2008 Beijing Olympics, Performed by Sarah Brightman and Liu Huan) Orchestration
    • Dream of the Five Rings, Orchestration
    • Ritual Music, Orchestration
    • Lighting of the Olympic Cauldron, Orchestration
  • discography

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    The Official Album for Beijing 2008 Olympic Games

    2008, Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee

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    Orchestral Masters, Vol. 2

    The Aroma of Exotic 

    2014, Ablaze Records

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    But Always

    Original Motion Picture Score

    2015, Z-1 Music Records

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    Highway of Love

    Original Motion Picture Score

    2015, Z-1 Music Records

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    Dali Holiday

    Original Motion Picture Score

    2017, Z-1 Music Records

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    The Guiding Star

    Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

    2021, Z-1 Music Records

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    Piano Spectrums

    Etude for Concert

    2022, Navona Records

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    Where the Heart Is

    Vocal and Instrumental

    2022, Z-1 Music Records

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    Feng Zikai's May

    Original Soundtrack

    2023, Z-1 Music Records

  • Music Score

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    Etude for Concert

    for piano

  • Videos

    Sample clips in different genres

    Composer Reel 2018

    Music for Screen

    Excerpts from film, TV series, Documentary, Short, Music video and Show

    Motherland

    Film Score

    Main title from the film My People, My Country

    The Theme of The 7th Company

    Film Score

    The theme used in the first trailer of the Battle at Lake Changjin

    Trinity Dance

    Contemporary Classical

    Yuri Bashmet, Andrey Usov, Elizaveta Solonchenko and Moscow Soloists Chamber Orchestra

    Elegy for Strings

    Contemporary Classical

    Lviv chamber orchestra, Conductor Ferdinando Nazzaro

    Like Water

    Song MV

    Written and produced by Zhiyi Wang, Performed by Hong Ru

    Romantic Attachment

    Song MV

    Written and produced by Zhiyi Wang, Performed by Shilei Chang

  • reviews

    "Zhiyi's music demonstrates an innate lyricism, and also shows a great deal of craft and skill. Like many composers he seeks to fuse the music of Asian heritage with the techniques and forms of Western classical music, and he does so in a very convincing manner. His Asian background is apparent, but he avoids clichés and the obvious. His music demonstrates a broad emotional range, as well, and he can paint effectively on both large- and small-scale musical canvases."

    -Marc Satterwhite, Director of Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition

    "The greatest composer of all time in our opera house."

    -Guoyong Zhang, Former president of Shanghai Opera House

    The Aroma of Exotic

    "The Aroma of Exotic is very interesting and can be viewed as a cross-cultural experience by an Occidental experiencing Oriental culture or vice versa. At times I was reminded of the dawn section of Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe, and I liked this work a lot."

    -Geoff Pearce, Music & Vision

    Elegy for Strings

    "The score is deep and inspired by an exceptional musical talent! "

    - Ferdinando Nazzaro, Artistic Director of KLK New Music

    Three Overlapping Sounds

    "This three-movement piece unfolds varied waves of sentiments by distinct expressions of strings. The first part creates an atmosphere where all four instruments resonate as a group in terms of the dynamic change, the shifting of harmony and the collocation of melodic lines. Though it has a long breath and very delicate sound, a latent tension is possessed within the drive of adagio. The second part reveals an inside throbbing by imitating wings of insects to portrait those subtle affections, which touch our inner feelings in a sentimental way. The third part is relatively contrastive, from a tranquil start to an insanely wild presto, then back to peace ultimately. It reflects certain unpredictable mood that twists without signs. The piece adopts western form and vocabulary, yet conveys implicit oriental flavor."

    -Alice Jiang, Music Weekly Journal

     

    "The skills in composition and orchestration are very achieved, and the writing tasteful and touching."

    -Gabriel Yared, Academy Award-winning Composer

    Three Art Songs

    "They sound like an opera!"

    -Morton Subotnick, Composer

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