This page presents Yuwan Zhang’s integrated research and artistic practice. Grounded in voice-centered inquiry, Yuwan’s work explores sound as both creative expression and embodied research. The first sections focus on sound embodiment, education, and public engagement, followed by selected works in composition and performance that reflect these ongoing explorations.
本页呈现峪晚彰结合研究与艺术创作的整体实践。其以人声为核心的探究为基础，探索声音既作为创作的表达，也作为具身研究的途径。前半部分聚焦于声音具身性、教育与公共参与，后半部分展示其在作曲与表演方面与此相关的实践成果。
このページでは、Yuwan Zhangのリサーチと芸術実践を統合的に紹介します。声を中心とした探究を基盤に、Yuwanは音を創造的表現であり同時に身体的リサーチの方法として考察しています。前半は音の具身性・教育・社会的関わりに焦点を当て、後半では作曲とパフォーマンスを通してその探究を具体化しています。
Page Overview 本页导览 ページ概要
1. Research & Public Engagement｜学术与公共实践｜研究と社会的実践
Sound Embodiment & Research｜声音具身性与研究
Human–Plant Sonic Dialogue｜人与植物的声音对话
Ritual, Body, and Vocal Embodiment｜仪式・身体与人声的体现
Past Experiences｜既往实践
Future Direction: Embodied Voice Practice｜未来方向：具身人声实践
Reclaiming Sound: Courses for All Ages｜重拾声音：面向全龄的课程
2. Composition & Collaborations｜作曲与合作｜作曲およびコラボレーション
3. Performance & Presentation｜表演与登台｜パフォーマンスとステージ活動
1. Research & Public Engagement
学术与公共实践 研究と社会的実践
Sound Embodiment & Research
声音具身性与研究
Voice Beyond Semantics
“Semantics” refers to meaning in language; this work explores voice beyond it.
In Yuwan Zhang’s vocal performances and compositions, language is released from meaning and returns to its origin in sound and body. Through reconstructed, hybrid, or invented phonetic systems, Yuwan explores how the human voice communicates through resonance rather than semantics. Each utterance becomes vibration, gesture, and presence: a movement of the body that remembers before words.
This practice questions the hierarchy of understanding and reimagines voice as a shared field of perception. When meaning dissolves, what remains is connection through tone, breath, and emotion: the voice as an embodied act of listening.
The accompanying playlist gathers Yuwan’s vocal compositions and improvisations without lyrical meaning. Each piece explores the voice as vibration, texture, and emotional resonance beyond words, inviting listeners to experience these works not through interpretation but through sensation and presence.
Embodied Resonance
Human–Plant Sonic Dialogue: Exploring Human Voice, Body Feedback, and Plant Interaction
In collaboration with the documentary Arbors, Herbs and Banana Leaves (dir. Xiaohui Liu), this practice-based research explores how sound functions as an embodied process linking humans and nature. Yuwan Zhang integrates plant-generated music from the film, recorded from plants regarded as sacred and spiritually resonant in local belief, with vocal improvisation and biofeedback signals collected through the Touch Me MIDI interface, creating a living sonic dialogue between body and plant. The project investigates how voice, movement, and physiological response can record emotional and ecological states, focusing not on aesthetic outcome but on presence and perception.
The work will be showcased at the American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting (New Orleans, Nov 21, 2025), where audiences will experience how their own bodily feedback resonates with plant sound. This inquiry situates sound embodiment as a method of ecological listening and artistic research within education and cultural practice.
具身共振：人声、身体反馈与植物互动的探索
本研究与纪录片《三个世界》（导演：刘晓慧）合作展开，以实践为基础的方法探讨声音如何作为一种具身过程，连接人类与自然。峪晚彰将纪录片中采录的植物音乐（这些植物在当地信仰中被视为神圣并具有灵性共鸣）与人声即兴及通过 Touch Me MIDI 装置采集的生理反馈信号结合，形成身体与植物之间的动态声音对话。
项目研究人声、身体运动与生理反应如何记录情绪与生态状态，关注的并非审美结果，而是“当下的在场”与“感知的过程”。
该项目将于 2025年11月21日 在 美国人类学年会（新奥尔良） 展出，观众将体验自身身体反馈与植物声音的共鸣。此研究将“声音体现”视为一种生态聆听与艺术研究的方法，连接教育与文化实践的领域。
Embodied Chant: Ritual, Body, and Vocal Embodiment
The vocal chant iw nsw m pr.f mi ra m pt was improvised and recorded on March 17, 2024, and was presented in London in September 2025 as part of a ritual-based event Ritual in Progress curated by Every Archive, this work features Yuwan Zhang’s solo vocal improvisation in collaboration with contemporary dancer, Peiyi Zhong, and singing bowl percussionist, Bei. The piece explores how voice and movement interweave to form a living dialogue between bodies and sound. Sung in reconstructed Ancient Egyptian language, whose words carry no literal meaning to the audience, the voice functions as a bridge of resonance rather than comprehension, embodying an ancient energy through modern presence.
Through spontaneous interaction between the dancer and voice, the performance transformed the space into a collective field of listening and awareness, inviting the audience to co-create a shared moment of embodied connection. The work concluded with a singing bowl meditation, extending the resonance into a communal and reflective state. Click the poster for the video and more details.
具身咏唱：人声、身体与仪式空间
咏唱作品《iw nsw m pr.f mi ra m pt》于2024年3月17日即兴唱作录制，并于2025年9月由在英国伦敦的Every Archive策展的“物言仪启”仪式活动中呈现，由峪晚彰提供音频，与即兴舞者Peiyi Zhong和颂钵艺术家Bei共同完成。作品探讨声音与身体之间的互动如何在空间中生成即时的对话。演唱使用重构的古埃及语，虽无人能听懂其意义，却因“人声”本身建立了共振与连接，使古老的能量在当下被具身呈现。
在人声与舞蹈的即兴交流中，表演逐渐将空间转化为一个共同聆听与觉察的场域，观众在其中参与并共创出短暂而深刻的身体连结。作品以颂钵冥想收尾，使声音的余韵延伸至群体共鸣与内在静思的层面。点击图片查看完整视频与更多细节。
Sonic Narratives of Presence
Exploring how sound creates presence through resonance, dialogue, and atmosphere.
This body of work explores how sound can evoke the physical and emotional memory of being present. By integrating dialogues, ambient recordings, and environmental textures into musical composition, Yuwan Zhang creates immersive sonic narratives that invite listeners to inhabit a moment through listening.
Rather than representing space, these works embody it. The act of hearing becomes an experience of presence, where environmental sound and human voice merge into lived perception. Through resonance and atmosphere, Yuwan seeks to create an intimate field of listening, a space where perception becomes both personal and shared.
The accompanying playlist gathers selected sound pieces and compositions that weave together ambient sound, spoken voice, and musical texture. Each work invites the listener to enter a distinct sonic moment and experience presence through resonance, memory, and awareness.
Education & Workshops
教育与工作坊
Past Experiences
Sound and Memory Workshop
As a sound and voice educator, Yuwan Zhang believes that the human voice carries the power to represent memory, identity, and embodied knowledge. Yuwan’s teaching and research explore how vocal expression can reconnect individuals with their sensory histories and transform listening into a practice of learning and reflection.
In November 2025, Yuwan’s project will be realized as a workshop at the Multi-cultural Arts Festival in Melbourne, Australia, inviting participants to recreate and respond to the sounds of their childhood. Through collective sound-making and embodied reflection, the workshop demonstrates how sound and voice can serve as educational tools that link memory, creativity, and shared experience.
Teaching & Leadership Experience
Conducting Assistant and Guest Conductor, New Music Ensemble, Columbia College Chicago, IL, September 2024-May 2025
Assisted in ensemble direction, rehearsal organization, and premiere performances of contemporary works.
Author, A Brief Discussion on Effectively Guiding Children to Understand and Express Music, Time Education, March 2024
Published article exploring child-centered approaches to music education through sound and embodied learning.
Judge, Voice of the Eastern U.S. Finals, Philadelphia, PA, June 2023
Served as vocal adjudicator for finalists in the East Coast regional competition, evaluating musicality, expression, and stage presence.
Conductor and Director, Baltimore Chinese Adult Choir and Youth Choir, MD, August 2022-March 2023
Led two choirs in bilingual repertoire and intercultural performances, developing community-based and student-oriented choral education programs with Baltimore Chinese School.
With a strong background in vocal teaching and extensive experience working with students from diverse cultural and musical backgrounds, Yuwan Zhang brings a uniquely integrative approach to voice education that emphasizes creativity, embodiment, and emotional awareness. Building upon this foundation, Yuwan’s forthcoming research expands toward embodied voice pedagogy and participatory learning.
Future Direction: Embodied Voice Practice
Exploring voice as awareness, connection, and embodied learning.
Building upon the sound embodiment research and experience in vocal education, Yuwan envisions an evolving practice that bridges artistic creation, pedagogy, and participatory learning. From 2026 onward, Yuwan intends to develop workshops and educational experiments that explore the voice as a site of awareness, connection, and embodied learning.
The practice integrates breath, body movement, and improvisation to guide participants toward sensing sound as a living process rather than a performative outcome. Through collective exploration and reflective listening, these practices aim to open spaces where voice becomes a way of knowing and being, shared between self and others.
Beyond the discourse of healing, Yuwan reimagines sound not as therapy or correction but as a practice of awareness and acceptance. Yuwan’s approach invites both educators and learners to meet sound as it is, emphasizing resonance over transformation and presence over perfection.
This direction will continue to grow through Yuwan’s planned study of Vedic sound traditions and voice alchemy, not only as techniques of healing but as pathways to understand how vibration and consciousness cultivate presence, perception, and compassion. Yuwan seeks mastery not through control, but through deep listening and embodied resonance. Through this integrated vision, Embodied Voice Practice becomes a bridge between sound art, embodied education, and collective reflection: a living pedagogy of listening and being.
Parallel Voices & Public Dialogue
平行之声
“Listening as dialogue, dialogue as creation.”
Parallel Voices is a public dialogue initiative founded by Yuwan Zhang to connect sound, education, and creative communities through conversation. It explores how listening can become a form of cultural exchange and collective reflection.
The project features dialogues with composers, educators, artists, and industry professionals, addressing themes such as identity, representation, and creative agency. Through panels, interviews, and curatorial writing, Yuwan seeks to cultivate spaces where voices intersect, and new understandings emerge.
Parallel Voices continues to evolve as both a research-based and community-centered practice, bridging artistic inquiry with public engagement.
Click on the images to view past events and media coverage.
2. Composition & Collaborations
作曲与合作 作曲およびコラボレーション
Published Works
发表作品
This page presents Yuwan Zhang’s published works, including music releases, interdisciplinary collaborations, and academic publications, reflecting Yuwan’s extended practice across sound, cross-cultural creation, movement, and sound embodiment in research and education.
本页收录峪晚彰发表作品，包括音乐出版、跨领域合作与学术论文，展现其在声音、跨文化、舞动，以及声音的具身性与研究教育之间的延伸实践。
Exhibitions & Showcases of Compositions
作品展览/ 合作
Interdisciplinary & Installation Works
跨领域与装置作品
声.流.时 Sound. Flow. Time at 层 STRATA: Future Art Archaeology 未来艺术考古, in collaboration with the Sculpture Department of the Academy of Arts & Design of Tsinghua University 清华大学美术学院雕塑系, Gobi, China. August 2025.
Click on here for more details of the installation work.
iw nsw m pr.f mi ra m pt at Body Movement: Vibration, Rhythm and Frequency 振动, 旋律和身体 from物言仪启 Ritual in Progress, in collaboration with London Design Festival, London, UK, September 2025.
Click here for more details of this interdisciplinary project.
3. Performance & Presentation
表演与登台 パフォーマンスとステージ活動
Vocal & Improvised Performance
声乐与即兴人声
Vocal Styles
声乐风格
An overview of Yuwan Zhang’s diverse vocal idioms, ranging from classical mezzo-soprano repertoire, jazz, pop, to experimental improvisation and cross-cultural timbres.
概述峪晚彰多元的声乐风格，涵盖从古典中高音曲目、爵士、流行，到实验性即兴与跨文化音色的广阔领域。
Festival & Exhibition Selections
展览与艺术节展映
暘羽仪 Sol Bird Rite, Theme Song of Sunvala Music Culture Festival
太阳谷文化音乐节主题曲 (Guiyang, China, August 2025)
Special Guest Musician of Sunvala Music Culture Festival
太阳谷文化音乐节特邀音乐人 (Guiyang, China, August 2025)
暘羽仪 Sol Bird Rite as the opening ceremony song of 物言仪启 Ritual in Progress, in collaboration with London Design Festival, London, UK, September 2025.
Click here for more details of this project.
Universe’s Children at 过渡液 Il Campione Liquido, Design Sulmondo Gallery, Napoli, Italy. July 2025.
Universe’s Children at Everything Then is Now – Alter Peckham, in collaboration with London Design Festival, London, UK, September 2025.
Click here for more details of this project.
Performance & Recital Archive
声乐演出与个人音乐会存档
This page documents Yuwan Zhang’s earlier vocal performances and solo recitals before 2025, reflecting Yuwan’s strong foundation and versatility across classical, jazz, pop, and experimental repertoire.
Click here to view the Performance and Recital Archive page.
Vocal Credit
声乐作品署名
Opening song vocal for AI animation The Origami Fairy 纸灵 (April 2025)
AI短片动画《纸灵》片头曲献唱
Conducting
指挥
As We Are
Columbia College New Music Ensemble Concert, December 2024
