Bryan Christian

Bryan Christian is a composer based in the Washington D.C. metro area. His music focuses on the intersection of radiant harmonic landscapes, glacial pacing, and AI and advanced analytics.

Christian’s work is heavily influenced by spectral thinking, which focuses on sound color and change as a principal element of music, yet he also has a deep love for resonant major and minor harmonies. These musical inspirations are completely at odds with one another, which Christian views as the perfect departure point for his work. Yet, this is indeed only a departure since the music flows deeper than the sound worlds themselves and engages in themes centering around water, nature, mountains, geography, geology, failure of language and the ineffable, and spirituality, all intertwined. The slow pacing commonly found throughout Christian’s music is also deliberate: it invites listeners to aurally zoom in and explore the most minute changes and interrelationships between the nuanced sounds while reinforcing the spiritual undertones of his music.

Christian holds a Ph.D. in Music Composition from Duke University and additional degrees from the University of California San Diego, the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, and the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University. Christian also holds an MBA from Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Music and currently leads the AI and analytics cloud transformation at the largest credit union in the world where he serves over 11 million members.

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United States