Meet Yunxin An | Composer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Yunxin An and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Yunxin, what are you inspired by?
I gather my inspirations from literature the most, and especially poems. I always love to imagine the picture and story behind the words and transform it into music message. Also I would say paintings, same as a lot of composers. And in fact there are lots of same descriptions we use both in music and painting, for example “Impressionism”, and if we take a look at those arts, listen to those pieces we could find lots of similar element and I always feel it fascinating.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I start musical training when I was 3. My older sister is also a musician so I went to solfeggio class with her all the time. I was so emulative had a really high standard for my self since that time. My mom told me every time when I made mistake or couldn’t figure out the right notes or chords I’ll be upset about myself and sometimes started sobbing at the class (I know I must be annoying). Then I chose concert composition when I was 14 and went to a music high school. Now I think this might be a difference of the education between China and the U.S.. I found a lot of Chinese people start their professional training in a really young age like I did. I am not saying there is anything negative about made the choice early. But when I was doing my underrate in the conservatory it did made me feel like “Oh my god I am doing this things for so long! Do I really know what I want when I made the choice when I was only 14? Do I have other possibilities other than composition?” It was not easy to answer those questions but I did feel that I want to learn more, as for what to learn it doesn’t matter. I started expand my knowledge base by reading, listened to different type of music ( I was totally a classical person before that), started trying different things like modeling, learning to be a barista, meeting new friends from different area, start therapy once a week….
I guess the reason why I changed my career path to film composition is kinda related to my eagerness to learn. And even for now I can’t say it for sure film music will be my final decision despite I enjoy it a lot. I used to fear the uncertainty of life and worry about every choice I made or I’m gonna make but honestly you just gotta make the call. And have the faith in yourself no matter what’s gonna happen you can handle it. All the things you learn will come together and help you to go through it.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
NYC is such a chaos city, chaos in its own way. If you just sit on the street for all day you can see so many interesting stuff, good and bad. Whitney Museum is amazing, and now they’re having and exhibition about Edward Hopper. Central Park will be a good place to just walk around and chill but I do hope the weather could be better. There is a playground in the park which I always go to play the swing. And then grab a hot chocolate, go to the rink for some iceskating. I love jazz so Village Vanguard will be on the list for sure.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
First would definitely be my family, they give me all the supports and always make me feel safe to chase my dream. Also my therapist Dr. Deng, through the past seven years she helped me a lot on my journey of understanding myself and being a person with more awareness.

Website: yunxin-an.com

Instagram: yunxin_iris