Ji Youn Kang, born in Seoul, South Korea in 1977, studied Music Composition at the Chu-Gye University of the Arts from 1998 to 2002 under Yong Shil Park and was awarded the president prize with the bachelor's degree. She moved to the Netherlands in 2006, and expanded her knowledge in Electronic music and music composition under Paul Berg in Sonology 2nd phase at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague, and in 2008 achieved her master’s degree with distinction. From 2009 to 2011, she continued studying Composition at Conservatorium van Amsterdam under Wim Henderickx and Jorrit Tamminga, where she achieved her second Master’s degree and explored more on composing for instruments and electronics.

A number of her music pieces have been composed based on the rites of Korean Shamanism, and many of them were written for Wave Field Synthesis System (192 loudspeakers) playback, exploring the relationship between musical and physical spaces. At the same time she has been composing live electronic pieces for both traditional and non-traditional instruments, ranging from a solo instrument to a large orchestra, exploring mostly the primitive, empowering rhythmical elements and the noisy sound sources that the Korean ritual music involves.

She has been also active as a solo performer mainly seeking for the ways to combine three different sound areas on stage; acoustic instruments, analog and digital sound with handmade analog synthesizers with live processing on laptop.

She is often collaborating with other composers as a sound designer and music technician, creating electronic patches and sounds for their compositions.

Her pieces have been played in many places and festivals including La Biennale di Venezia in Italy, the Gaudeamus Muziekweek, Rewire Festival, Sonic Acts, STRP, TodaysArt, ModernBody, International Film Festival Rotterdam in the Netherlands, Internationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt in Germany, Sonar in Spain, Festival Archipel in Switzerland, sonADA in the United Kingdom, SICMF in South Korea, Time of Music in Finland and Royaumont, Synthesis in France.

Other than working as a freelence composer, she is currently one of the staff members/teachers at the Institute of Sonology, giving a course on 'Spatial music composition for WFS system' and 'Preperation for the indiidual projects,' and is a researcher in University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, researching on Speculative Sound Synthesis with David Pirrò and Luc Döbereiner. This project is funded by the Austrian Science Fund for a period of three years. She is also one of the board members of the stichting Game of Life Foundation(WFS System) and New Emergences(Safe Space).

More information about her music and works can be found in other pages.

Download Full CV (updated in July 2024)