Younghi Pagh-Paan (*1945, Cheongju, South Korea) studied at the Seoul National University and at the University of Music Freiburg with Klaus Huber (composition), Brian Ferneyhough (analysis), Peter Förtig (music theory) and Edith Picht‑Axenfeld (piano). The performance of her orchestral piece Sori at the 1980 Donaueschingen Festival made her known to an international audience. Pagh-Paan’s works seek to revisit the spirit of Korean music through sophisticated Western compositional techniques. Her oeuvre has sparked a growing interest at major new music festivals and in concert series all over Europe. She won first prize at the fifth Composers Seminar in Boswil (Switzerland), first prize at the Rostrum of Composers (Unesco, Paris), the Nan‑Pa Music Award (Korea), the Paiknam Lifetime Achievement Prize (Seoul), among others, and was awarded the honorary citizenship of the city of Panicale. She has been a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts since 2009. Younghi Pagh‑Paan lives in Bremen and Panicale (Italy).