Described by The New York Times as “spellbinding” and “delightfully quirky matched with interpretive sensitivity,” Phyllis Chen (2022 Guggenheim Fellow, 2019 Cage-Cunningham Fellow) is a composer, pianist, and sound artist whose music emerges from a tactile exploration of objects and sound.

Chen began studying piano at the age of five and discovered the toy piano later in her career. Instantly captivated by its possibilities, she embraced the instrument’s lack of historical baggage as fertile ground to cultivate her own artistic voice—one shaped by her experiences as a third-culture kid. The toy piano’s raw, unrefined timbre inspired her to create highly personal miniature theatre works, including The Memoirist, The Slumber Thief, and Down the Rabbit-Hole, in collaboration with video artist Rob Dietz. Her interdisciplinary solo work Lighting the Dark was praised by The New York Times as “by turns poignant, humorous and virtuosic… a slyly subversive take on issues relating to femininity, technology and power…the looping, spellbinding music… a fitting tribute to the modest, repetitive, yet quietly heroic work of women.”

Her multi-layered toy piano composition Through the Thicket of Stars, inspired by a scroll painting by author and illustrator Grace Lin, premiered at the Kaufman Center’s Piano Dialogues in April 2022. Chen is also one of the composers for The Other Mozart, a one-woman play about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s forgotten sister Nannerl, written and performed by Sylvia Milo. Together with co-composer and sound designer Nathan Davis, she received the 2015 New York Innovative Theatre Award for “Best Original Music in a Play.”

In 2007, Chen founded UnCaged Toy Piano, an initiative dedicated to promoting new works for unconventional instruments. Since then, she has received over 200 commissioned pieces from composers worldwide. In 2011, she launched the first biennial UnCaged Toy Piano Festival, a three-day celebration of new works and toy instrumentalists that has since attracted audiences from across the globe. In 2017, UnCaged Toy Piano partnered with the Conlon Foundation in the Netherlands to present the Robot Toy Piano Project at Utrecht’s Museum Speelklok and at the 4th UnCaged Toy Piano Festival in New York City, as part of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek.

Chen is also a founding member of the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICEensemble) in New York City. She has released five albums, including three solo recordings (Concert Artists Guild, cerumenspoon, New Focus Recordings) and a collaborative album with indie band Cuddle Magic on FYO Records.