Jiwei Zou was drawn to music composition since high school, when he formed his metal band Aranox

in Beijing 2014. By that time, even without being able to read music, he completed a 60-minute metal

song “Wanderer”

, and performance live all across the city.

In college, Zou studied Music with a composition track at University of Rochester. He has since in fond

with neo-romanticism music, with a huge influence from the Finnish maestro Einojuhani Rautavaara.

In 2022, his first symphonic poem “Geng-Tsu” won that year’s Mostly Modern Festival orchestra

composition contest, and earned one of the only two spots for a premiere. His “Nebulae” for Violin,

Clarinet, and Piano, played by American Modern Ensemble, was also premiered in the same festival.

After a year working as a software engineer in China after college, Zou continued his musical journeyin Columbia College Chicago studying composition for the screen.

His works ranges from orchestra,

chamber music, film music, game music, and the origin of his music journey – metal music. They all

reflects a neo-romanticism style of sound, focusing on rich and soul-touching harmonic languages and

profound emotional depth.

Zou’s work has won many international awards. Among them, the most prominent ones are two Special

Prizes in the Iseshima Popular Music Composition Competition, a Platinum Award in Fenix

International Music Competition, a Second Prize in WCMA International Composition Competition,

and two Platinum Prizes in the Debussy International Music Competition.