
When Tan Dun’s score for Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon won an Oscar in 2000, he entered a realm of celebrity to which few classical composers have access. Now he’s even a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador alongside the likes of Laura Bush and Princess Caroline of Hanover.
Celebrity indeed. Born in China in 1957 and living in the US since 1986, he writes music that travels easily across cultures and between eras. He readily embraces the broad, schmaltzy lushness of film music, yet he’s equally at home exploiting Western avant-garde traditions or ancient Chinese rituals and instruments.