Photo by Peter Shin

Aaron Israel Levin is an American composer who writes music guided by the emotional dynamism of storytelling and drama. He draws from an eclectic range of musical and extra-musical influences, inspired equally by American minimalism and European modernism, Jewish folklore and Italian cinema, nostalgia and the immediate present. Aaron has collaborated with and been commissioned by the Aizuri Quartet, the American Composers Orchestra, the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, Bent Frequency Duo, the Chelsea Symphony, Fifth House Ensemble, loadbang, loop38, Onix Ensamble, the Yale Philharmonia, mezzo-sopranos Kayleigh Butcher and Lisa Neher, and percussionists Dmitrii Nilov and Sam Um. Passionate about interdisciplinary collaboration, Aaron also frequently works with artists in theater, dance, and film. Frequent collaborators include playwright Christopher Gabriel Nuñez, choreographer Celeste Miller, and filmmaker Harris Gurney. 
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In 2019, Aaron was selected to take part in the Underwood New Music Readings with the American Composers Orchestra under conductor Ludovic Morlot, and was subsequently awarded their Audience Choice Commission. His music has been heard and presented by the DiMenna Center (NYC); Spectrum (NYC); Constellation (Chicago); the Schubert Club (Saint Paul, MN); the Centro Nacional de las Artes (Mexico City); New Music Gathering 2020; and, the Bowdoin Festival; Fresh Inc. Festival; Oregon Bach Festival Composers Symposium; and, the Source Song Festival. More recently, Aaron has been a composition fellow at the Aspen Music Festival & School; the Red Note Music Festival; the New Amsterdam Records Composers Lab; and, the Young Composers Meeting with orkest de ereprijs. Select honors include the prestigious Duckman Prize from the Aspen Music Festival & School; the Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts & Letters; the second prize from the Boston GuitarFest Composition Competition; and, recognition as a finalist for the ASCAP Morton Gould Award. 
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Originally from St. Paul, Minnesota, Aaron is a graduate of Grinnell College (BA) and the Yale School of Music (MM), where he is currently pursuing his DMA. His mentors include Katherine Balch, Martin Bresnick, Aaron Jay Kernis, David Lang, Eric McIntyre, and Chris Theofanidis.