CHINARY UNG  

Chinary Ung was the first American composer to win the highly coveted international Grawemeyer Award (1989), sometimes called the Nobel Prize for music composition. Among other honours, Ung has received awards from The Kennedy Center (Friedheim award), The American Academy of Arts and Letters, Asia Foundation, Asian Cultural Council, Rockefeller Foundation, Ford Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, Joyce Foundation, and The National Endowment for the Arts.

Now a United States citizen, Chinary Ung was born in Takeo, Cambodia in 1942. He came to New York City in 1964 to further his studies in music at the Manhattan School of Music. Ung received his Doctorate of Musical Arts in music composition, with honours, in 1974 from Columbia University. Since then, he has taught composition at Northern Illinois University, Connecticut College, The University of Pennsylvania, and Arizona State University. He is currently Professor of Composition at the University of California San Diego.