NYC-based composer and educator Longfei Li’s music has been performed internationally across North America, Asia, and Europe. He has collaborated with numerous renowned performers and ensembles, including Miranda Cuckson, Lucy Dhegree, Vasko Dukovski, Ben Roidl-Ward, Loadbang, Longleash, and Yarn/Wire. He has won numerous international awards, including the Samadis' Records & International Composition Competition, the Manhattan Prize, the International Composition Competition by Academia Musica Wien, and the 16th Sun River Prize New Music Composition Competition. In 2022, he received the Nicholas Flagello Award from the Manhattan School of Music in recognition of his outstanding achievements in composition.
As a guest composer, Li has been invited to participate in numerous international music festivals, including the Loretto Project in Louisville, HighScore Festival in Milan, reMusik Festival in St. Petersburg, the Vienna Summer Music Festival, and the Yarn/Wire International Institute. He has also presented lectures and workshops at institutions such as the Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest and the University of Louisville.
As Program Director of New Living Music, he has co-curated, organized, and produced the New Sounds New Sounds New concert series in collaboration with Reiko Füting, Dean of Academic Core and Head of Composition at the Manhattan School of Music. In this role, he has worked closely with leading new music performers such as Ty Bouque, Dan Lippel, Martin Schmeding, and Rafał Żółkos. By the end of 2025, the series had presented nearly 20 concerts in New York City.
As an active young scholar in the field of music studies, Li has published multiple academic writings that explore contemporary composition pedagogy. His article A Review of Lei Liang’s Miller Theatre Portrait Concert was published in Asking through Music: Treatises and Analyses of Lei Liang’s Music (Shanghai Conservatory of Music Press). His interview essay A Dialogue with Lei Liang: The Joy of Teaching Contemporary Composition was later published in Toward New Landscapes. Under his mentorship, numerous students have received prestigious national composition awards. Li’s aesthetics, teaching philosophy, and theoretical research have been reviewed and reported by major new music media such as I Care If You Listen and Schmopera, and prominent music journals and newspapers in China, including Music Weekly and Beijing Youth Daily.
Li earned composition degrees from Manhattan School of Music (DMA), California State University, Northridge (MM), and China Central Conservatory of Music (BM). His principal composition teachers include Reiko Füting, Lei Liang, Liviu Marinescu, Lida Zhang, Jianping Tang, and Guoping Jia. He currently serves as a faculty member of the Manhattan School of Music Precollege.