Vivian Fung, Composer; World Premiere of Her String Quartet No. 2 with the Shanghai Quartet April 23, 2009

Canadian composer Vivian Fung’s new work was commissioned by the Shanghai Quartet to celebrate the quartet’s 25th anniversary season. The new work provides a prime example of Fung’s interest in using non-Western music as source material. The second quartet features a traditional Chinese folk song, transformed in Fung’s own unique way, as a connecting thread woven throughout its six movements.

Since earning her doctorate from The Juilliard School in 2002, Vivian Fung has increasingly embraced non-Classical influences, including jazz and non-Western sources such as folksongs from the minority regions of China and Indonesian gamelan music. Fung's music was recently described by the San José Mercury News as "enchanting . . . . [H]er music . . . summons images of dusk and reaches for hidden places and states of mind.

Official Website: www.vivianfung.net