1. Christopher Chiyan Tin was born on May 21,1976 and is an American composer of art music, composing for film, television, and video game soundtracks.
34 Facts About Christopher Tin
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Christopher Tin's work is primarily orchestral and choral, often with a world music influence.
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Christopher Tin was born May 21,1976, in Palo Alto, California, to immigrant parents from Hong Kong.
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Christopher Tin attended Stanford University, and had a brief period as an exchange student at the University of Oxford.
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Christopher Tin double majored in music composition and English literature, and minored in art history.
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Christopher Tin graduated in 1998, receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors, and continued to study at Stanford, receiving a Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, with an emphasis in film studies, in 1999.
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In 1999, Christopher Tin was admitted to the Royal College of Music's Master of Music in Composition for Screen program, and simultaneously received a Fulbright Scholarship, which was the first to be awarded for film scoring.
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Christopher Tin graduated with Distinction and won the Joseph Horovitz composition prize as the student with the highest overall marks in his course.
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Christopher Tin found his first professional employment as a staff arranger for Silva Screen Records, where his job was to transcribe orchestral film scores by ear so they could be rerecorded by live orchestra for album release.
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In 2000, Christopher Tin moved to Los Angeles and continued to arrange scores for Silva Screen Records while searching for more permanent employment.
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Christopher Tin found freelance work with composers Joel McNeely, who hired him to make synthesized mockups of his film scores for a series of Disney films, and John Ottman, who gave him incidental music to write for X2: X-Men United.
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Christopher Tin worked for record producer Michael Brook, who took him to India on tour as a keyboardist.
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In 2003, Christopher Tin participated in the Sundance Institute Film Music Lab, where he met jazz pianist Billy Childs.
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In 2009, Christopher Tin released his classical crossover album Calling All Dawns.
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Christopher Tin had never intended the work to be performed live many ensembles have performed it in this manner.
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On July 5,2017, at the 70th Anniversary of the Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod, Christopher Tin himself conducted the entire work with the Welsh National Opera Orchestra and a group of international soloists, including Elin Manahan Thomas, Nathalie Pires, Joel Virgel, and Nominjin, and a mass choir made up of singers from Wales, South Africa, Taiwan, and the United States.
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The album was recorded at Abbey Road Studios with Christopher Tin conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and features guest performances by the Soweto Gospel Choir, Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares, Kardes Turkuler, Dulce Pontes, Nominjin, Roopa Mahadevan, Anonymous 4, the Angel City Chorale, and Norwegian chamber choir Schola Cantorum.
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Christopher Tin centered his first tour around the work, conducting it in three cities in the UK.
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Christopher Tin returned to the Civilization franchise to compose the main theme for Civilization VI, a choral anthem called "Sogno di Volare".
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Christopher Tin released his third album, To Shiver the Sky, in August 2020 on the Decca Gold label.
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The album, like The Drop That Contained the Sea, was recorded at Abbey Road Studios, with Christopher Tin conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and features guest performances by Danielle de Niese, Pene Pati, ModernMedieval Voices, Anna Lapwood, the Pembroke College Girls' Choir, the Royal Opera Chorus, and The Assembly.
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The album was funded via Kickstarter, and Christopher Tin broke his own record for highest funded classical music project on the platform.
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The work's live premiere occurred on February 25,2023, at Stanford University, with Christopher Tin conducting VOCES8 and the VOCES8 Foundation Scholars, and featuring a reduced chamber orchestration performed by the Friction Quartet and pianist Keisuke Nakagoshi.
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Christopher Tin then reached out to Tin, and invited him to meet with her in San Francisco.
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In 2015, Christopher Tin composed the orchestral arrangements for trance artist BT's remix album Electronic Opus.
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In 2017, Christopher Tin announced an EDM-meets-orchestra collaboration with Australian DJ TyDi called Collide.
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Christopher Tin collaborated with Lang Lang on the 2016 release of a piano and orchestra suite of music from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
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Additionally, Christopher Tin has collaborated with Danny Elfman and Alan Menken.
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Christopher Tin has received commissions by Stratus Chamber Orchestra, Bangor Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra at St Matthew's and ISCMS Festival.
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Christopher Tin co-created the startup sound for the original Microsoft Surface computing platform.
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Christopher Tin was a judge on the 2017 season of the Welsh TV show Cor Cymru, a singing competition for amateur choirs airing on Welsh-language channel S4C.
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Christopher Tin is Honorary Artistic Director of the United Nations Chamber Music Society, Honorary President of the International Choral Festival Wales, and is a patron of El Sistema France.
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Christopher Tin is an honorary board member of the Chinese American Museum DC.
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Christopher Tin married Dyna Kau in 2013 and they have a daughter together, Penelope Rose, born in 2018.