Philon Philon Nguyen Nguyen
*3 December 1978
Works by Philon Philon Nguyen Nguyen
Biography
Philon (Phil) Nguyen (born 1978) is a composer of concert music, opera music and film music. He was born in Montreal (Quebec, Canada). As a child, he studied piano. Later, he would study film music composition at UQAM (Quebec, Canada) where he completed a DESS. His music also explores computational techniques applied to music composition. Phil also holds a PhD in Information Systems Engineering from Concordia University in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) where he researched neurological and cognitive techniques for the study of engineering design and creativity. He is a skillful programmer and mathematician. Phil is also completing a PhD in Fine Arts supervised by Eldad Tsabary at Concordia University since 2022. Phil has also followed workshops and tutorials at IRCAM and Darmstadt with composers such as Grégoire Lorieux, Chaya Czernowin, Steven Kazuo Takasugi, Arne Gieshoff, Hans Thomalla and Sarah Nemtsov.
Phil's compositions include an opera based on the play by Sarah Kane, Phaedra's Love (2020), the choral work Fragments for an Unfinished Requiem (2019), an opera based on a libretto he wrote for Sophocles' Antigone, entitled Sophocles: Antigone (2021) and a remodernisation of Chekhov's Cherry Orchard (2023).
Phil describes his music as musical deconstructivism, following the use of the term in architecture.
On his spare time, Phil also enjoys composing for short movies, amateur or professional. Film music has taught him the intimate relation between music and its effect, the semiotic relationship between image and sound and these have influenced his stage work.
Philon (Phil) Nguyen (born 1978) is a composer of concert music, opera music and film music. He was born in Montreal (Quebec, Canada). As a child, he studied piano. Later, he would study film music composition at UQAM (Quebec, Canada) where he completed a DESS. His music also explores computational techniques applied to music composition. Phil also holds a PhD in Information Systems Engineering from Concordia University in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) where he researched neurological and cognitive techniques for the study of engineering design and creativity. He is a skillful programmer and mathematician. Phil is also completing a PhD in Fine Arts supervised by Eldad Tsabary at Concordia University since 2022. Phil has also followed workshops and tutorials at IRCAM and Darmstadt with composers such as Grégoire Lorieux, Chaya Czernowin, Steven Kazuo Takasugi, Arne Gieshoff, Hans Thomalla and Sarah Nemtsov.
Phil's compositions include an opera based on the play by Sarah Kane, Phaedra's Love (2020), the choral work Fragments for an Unfinished Requiem (2019), an opera based on a libretto he wrote for Sophocles' Antigone, entitled Sophocles: Antigone (2021) and a remodernisation of Chekhov's Cherry Orchard (2023).
Phil describes his music as musical deconstructivism, following the use of the term in architecture.
On his spare time, Phil also enjoys composing for short movies, amateur or professional. Film music has taught him the intimate relation between music and its effect, the semiotic relationship between image and sound and these have influenced his stage work.
About the music
Phil was influenced by techniques developed at the Darmstadt school and IRCAM or American avant-garde. While a proponent of computational and new formal techniques applied to music composition, randomness and stochasticity, Phil also sometimes bifurcates towards minimalist system music, post-minimalist and neo-classical tangents in an attempt at synthesis.
Phil's music is based on a personal acceptance of the notion of transformation. In Alvin Lucier's work I am Sitting in a Room (1969), a recording is transformed in a self-recording process until all vocal information is lost. The notion of transduction is fundamental to Phil's composition work. This leads us to believe that the transformation process of the musical material is an additive/destructive process: information is not only lost, it is also created, transformed. Serial rotations, spectral reconstructions and mnemonic processes are then truly transformative and not only destructive.
Some descriptive notes can be also made about his operatic work. His opera Sarah Kane - Phaedra's Love (2020) starts with a build-up leading to a classic twelve-tone cluster with overtones inspired from O. Messiaen's rewriting of bird songs (to express the themes of irrationality and psychosis omnipresent in the opera, reminiscing Edgar Allen Poe's fearful raven) and uses extensively serial rotations or self-inspired transformations to develop the operatic material. The harmony uses aleatoric techniques reminiscent of W.R. Lutosławski . The overture for his opera Sophocles - Antigone (2021) overlays quotes from Pergolesi's Stabat Mater that are approximately retrieved using mnemonic processes which distort the original material. Both operas try to balance modernist and post-modernist techniques, melody and dissonance, expression and rationality. Both operas research transformations of the modernist materials to achieve a personal and innovative voice. Also, the opera The Cherry Orchard (After Anton Chekhov) relies heavily on Artificial Intelligence techniques developed by composer himself. Each of Phil's work explore different generative processes as creative impetuses.
Available Recordings
Digital mixes with real actors and singers of the operas Sarah Kane: Phaedra's Love (2020) and Sophocles: Antigone (2021) are available on Spotify and major streaming platforms. The Black Box Concert is also available on streaming. CDs of the operas and The Black Box Concert are available on BandCamp: https://philonnguyen.bandcamp.com/.