2023-2024 Hearing in Color Young Composer Residency

Nyandeng Juag

Nyandeng Juag is a South Sudanese-American vocalist, conductor, and composer. She received her Bachelor of Arts in Music from Kenyon College in 2022. While at Kenyon, she studied voice with Rebecca Keck, conducting with Benjamin Locke, and composition with Ross Feller. Nyandeng sang in the Kenyon College Chamber Singers for four years and served as president her senior year. She was also president of Colla Voce, a treble-voice classical and folk a cappella group. Passionate about cultivating inclusive, genre-expansive musical spaces, Nyandeng co-founded and was president and co-music director of POCappella, a group for students of color performing music by artists of color. In summer 2020, Nyandeng was the Administrative & Sound Design intern at New Perspectives Theatre Company (New York City), and premiered her piece “Vibrates with Memory” at the Virtual Women’s Work Short Play Festival.

Nyandeng finds inspiration in her South Sudanese heritage and in diversifying classical music communities and repertoire. Nyandeng is also a singer-songwriter. She self-released her debut EP Fluorescent in 2021 and is now working on her next project. Nyandeng is currently based in her hometown of Augusta, Georgia, and hopes to relocate to Chicago in the coming months.

Nyandeng Juag

Past Young Composers

2022-2023: Ephraim Champion

Ephraim Champion is an active musician and composer in Chicago, Illinois. He received his Bachelor’s of Music in Performance (Horn) from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) where he studied with horn professors Kelly Langenberg and Jeremiah Frederick. At UIC, Ephraim was a recipient of the Joy and Bob Harnack Award and the winner of the Conducting Apprenticeship for Orchestra. He also studied composition with Marc Mellits, and composed for chamber groups such as The Back Pocket Duo and electric guitar quartet Instruments of Happiness. In 2020, Ephraim played horn on Leo Sowerby’s piece “Synconata, H. 176a” with the Andy Baker Orchestra on an album released by Cedille Records. The following year, Ephraim’s composition, Scenes from South Shore, Chicago, was commissioned and premiered by the Gaudete Brass Quintet as part of the 2021 Ear Taxi Music Festival, receiving praise from the Chicago Classical Review as a “strongly individual and compelling work”. In 2022, Ephraim’s vocal piece, Humanhood, was premiered as part of Constellation Men’s Ensemble’s 5th annual NOVA concert series.

Currently, Ephraim is pursuing his Master’s Degree in Orchestral Studies at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts. He is also a member of the 484th United States Army Reserve Band out of Arlington Heights, Illinois, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Committed to the growth of music and contribution to his community, Ephraim serves as the Artistic Director and horn instructor at the West Point School of Music. Occasionally, Ephraim can be found playing horn and improvising in Isaiah Collier's group, The Celestials; playing keyboard/synth for Chicago hip-hop artist (and brother) Doso in his live band; or even performing some of his own piano works.

Outside of music, Ephraim maintains an active blog and writes stories in addition to spending time with his amazing wife Kianti, and their two adorable Yorkies, Heath and Ginger.

Ephraim’s piece, “All Things Sublime and Colossal”, was premiered on November 12, 2022 as part of La Caccina’s concert Extraordinary Machine.

2021-2022: Gwen Maramba

Gwen Maramba is an eighteen-year-old Filipino-American vocalist and composer. A member of the Main South High School class of 2021, she is currently pursuing a bachelor of music degree in vocal performance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Gwen is a former member of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Youth Opera Council, a graduate of the Merit School of Music, and the inaugural recipient of the the Hearing in Color Young Composer Residency. She loves to sing and compose pieces for treble ensembles, and is a member of the Women’s Glee Club at the University of Illinois.

Gwen has loved music ever since she was young, and her family is a huge source of musical inspiration to her. Gwen's piece, Standing on the Shoulders of Giants, was premiered on March 5, 2022 as part of La Caccina and Constellation Men’s Ensemble’s concert To Touch the Sky.

Ephraim Champion