Okkyung Lee

Okkyung Lee (born 1975 in Daejeon, South Korea) is a South Korean cellist, improviser, and composer.Lee moved to Boston in 1993, where she received a dual bachelor's degree in Contemporary Writing and Production and Film Scoring (Berklee College of Music), and a master's degree in Contemporary Improvisation (New England Conservatory of Music). In 2000, Lee moved to New York and immersed herself in the city’s downtown music scene. Since then, she has collaborated with a wide range of musicians and artists, including Laurie Anderson, Arca, David Behrman, Mark Fell, Douglas Gordon, Jenny Hval, Vijay Iyer, Christian Marclay, Lasse Marhaug, Haroon Mirza, Thurston Moore, Ikue Mori, Lawrence D “Butch” Morris, Jim O’Rourke, Evan Parker, Marina Rosenfeld, Wadada Leo Smith, Swans, Cecil Taylor, C. Spencer Yeh and John Zorn. In 2013, Lee curated the Music Unlimited festival in Wels, Austria, giving it the title "The most beautiful noise on earth".Lee received a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grant in 2010. and a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award in 2015. She lives in New York City.