Victor cui

Victor Tswei’s music is visceral, boisterous, and raw. He loves complex sonic tapestries of intensity, channeling the internal drama of sound through idiosyncratic instrumentation. Victor is especially fascinated by contemporary happenings and stories of individuals, and composes to problematize/dramatize personal/philosophical/socio-cultural ramifications of these happenings and stories through a direct, brutalistic voice. His other sources of inspiration include literature, languages, history, politics, zoology, singing, and soundscapes in nature, given his upbringing in the suburbs of Beijing – a mixture of the mountain’s subtle polyphony and the equally intricate cacophony of an Asian megapolis.

Praised as “fundamentally musical” by the Olga and Paul Menn Foundation at the University of Chicago, Victor has collaborated with many prestigious ensembles around the world, including Ensemble Modern, Mivos Quartet, Ensemble Musikfrabrik, and ~Nois. Victor’s music has been featured in Fontainebleau School of Music and Fine Arts, TUTTI Festival, Barcelona Modern, Valencia International Performance Academy, Impulse New Music Festival, Lake George Music Festival, etc. He is the 2025 2nd prize winner of the Abell Young Composer Award at the University of Louisville. Victor is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) degree at the Shepherd School of Music of Rice University on a full tuition scholarship. He holds a Master of Music (MM) in composition from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, and a Bachelor and Master of Arts (BA/MA) joint degree in Music and the Humanities from the University of Chicago.

A professional choral and solo singer (tenor-baritone), Victor participated in many premieres and performances of contemporary vocal pieces, including works by Angela Ortiz’s Dido Studies, Tyshawn Sorey’s Monochromatic Light, and works by James MacMillan, Tim Watts, David Lang, Craig Hella Johnson, Jonathan Dove, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir.