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Described by The New York Times <\/em>\u00a0as “spellbinding” and “delightfully quirky matched with interpretive sensitivity,” Phyllis (2022 Guggenheim Fellow, 2019 Cage-Cunningham Fellow) is a composer, pianist and sound artist whose music draws from her tactile exploration of object and sound. \u00a0She has performed her music at Lincoln Center, Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Abrons Arts Center, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Los Angeles County Museum, Baryshnikov Arts Center and numerous other places.<\/p>\n Phyllis started playing the piano at the age of five and came across the toy piano as an adult. As a pianist, she immediately \u00a0fell in love with the instrument’s \u00a0possibilities. Being bound to no history, the toy piano became her grounds to develop her personal voice, one that reflects her third culture kid experience. The unrefined and raw tone of the instrument inspired Phyllis to \u00a0create very personal miniature theatre works (The Memoirist, The Slumber Thief<\/i> and Down The Rabbit-Hole)<\/i> in collaboration with her partner and video artist, Rob Dietz. One of her interdisciplinary solo works, Lighting The Dark<\/em><\/a>, was described by the New York Times<\/em> as “by turns poignant, humorous and virtuosic, Chen’s performance offered a slyly subversive take on issues relating to femininity, technology and power…the looping, spellbinding music…became a fitting tribute to the modest, repetitive, yet quietly heroic work of women.”<\/p>\n Phyllis has received commissions by ensembles and organizations such as the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICEensemble), \u00a0A Far Cry<\/a>, Baryshnikov Arts Center<\/a>, Claire Chase<\/a>\u00a0Density Project, Opera Cabal<\/a>\u00a0Opera SHOP, Singapore International Festival of the Arts, the Roulette-Jerome, <\/a>\u00a0Look & Listen Festival, Jacob Greenberg, and others. She has received grants from New Music USA, Foundation for the Contemporary Arts, NYSCA (via Concert Artists Guild and Look & Listen Festival),\u00a0Fromm Foundation<\/a> and \u00a0the Pew Heritage Trust via Christ Church of Philadelphia<\/a>. She is working on “Through The Thicket of Stars,” a multi-layered toy piano piece based on an original scroll painting by children’s author\/illustrator Grace Lin. The new work will be premiered at Kaufman Center Piano Dialogues in April 2022.<\/p>\n Phyllis is one of the composers for the one-woman play, The Other Mozart <\/a><\/i>about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s forgotten sister Nannerl, \u00a0performed and written by Sylvia Milo<\/a>. She and co-composer\/sound designer Nathan Davis<\/a>, received the New York Innovative Theatre Award<\/a> for “Best Original Music in a Play” in 2015.<\/p>\n In 2009, Phyllis was the solo on-stage musician for the Off-Broadway production of Coraline<\/a>.<\/em>\u00a0Based on Neil Gaiman’s children’s book, the work was composed by Indie band-leader Stephin Merritt from the Magnetic Fields<\/a>, who scored the musical \u00a0for multiple keyboards of various sizes. \u00a0As the show’s sole instrumentalist, the Financial Times<\/em> claims ” Phyllis achieves dazzling effects with pianos both standard-sized and shrunken.”\u00a0Coraline<\/em> was staged at the Lucille Lortel Theater in the West Village.<\/p>\n In 2007, Phyllis founded the UnCaged Toy Piano<\/a>\u00a0to promote new works for unusual instruments. \u00a0Since its inception, she has received over 200 new pieces from composers around the globe. In 2011, Phyllis launched the first biennial UnCaged Toy Piano Festival<\/a>, a three day festival featuring new works \u00a0and a variety of toy instrumentalists and sound-makers. Each year the festival \u00c2\u00a0has been greeted with great enthusiasm, with audience members crossing state borders and oceans to attend. In 2017, UnCaged Toy Piano collaborated with the Conlon Foundation<\/a> in the Netherlands featuring the Robot Toy Piano. Selected works were presented as part of the Gaudeamus Muziekwiek at the Museum Speelklok<\/a>\u00a0 in Utrecht and the 4th UnCaged Toy Piano Festival in NYC.<\/p>\n Phyllis is one of the founding members of ICEensemble, the International Contemporary Ensemble<\/a>, based in New York City. \u00a0“On The Nature of Thingness” (Starkland) a collaborative album with ICE featuring the chamber works of Phyllis and ICE composer\/percussionist Nathan Davis, was awarded the 2016 Independent Music Award for Best Contemporary Classical Music Album.<\/p>\n