Bryan Lin

Bryan Lin is a Taiwanese-American conductor, composer, and arts administrator.

As a conductor, he is regarded for his versatility across genres and finds himself equally at home with choral and instrumental music while being a champion for new works. He is currently Director of the Senior Chorus at Mannes Prep in The New School’s College of Performing Arts; conductor, composer, and singer in C4: The Choral Composer/Conductor Collective in New York City; and adjunct faculty at Adelphi University as the Vocal Ensemble’s Interim Director. He is also founder and resident conductor of the Bay Area-based new music ensemble Stolen Time, and was previously Assistant Conductor for The Dessoff Choirs under the direction of Malcolm Merriweather. Recent projects include conducting the world premieres of Taylor Joshua Rankin's Gauze and Particulate with Stolen Time, Lili Tobias’ one-act chamber opera Apple of My Eye, and choral works by Mario Gullo, Evan Fontaine, David Huang Mailman, and Karen Siegel.

Bryan’s compositions use humor and social commentary to smear the boundaries of genres and traditions. Subject matters for past works have ranged from climate change denial to the vanity of self-promotion on social media. His harmonic and rhythmic sensibilities draw from minimalism and postmodern aesthetics, a product of his training as a jazz saxophonist. Past collaborations and commissions include Musaics of the Bay, International Orange Chorale of San Francisco, Guerrilla Composers Guild, Choral Chameleon, San Francisco Choral Artists, soprano Naomi Columna, Lehigh University Philharmonic Orchestra, and Monocacy Chamber Orchestra. 

In addition to performing and composing, Bryan enjoys an active career in arts administration and currently works at Miller Theatre at Columbia University, New York City’s leading new music presenter. He was previously the Manager of Ensemble Operations at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM), overseeing all artistic operations for collegiate ensembles and working closely with prolific faculty conductors such as Edwin Outwater and Nicole Paiement. In 2017, he was the Director of Hot Air Music Festival's eighth season, an annual day-long new music marathon held at SFCM.


Bryan received his M.M. in Composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and holds two degrees from Lehigh University — a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and a B.A. in Music — where he was also music director of the co-ed a cappella group Off The Record. He has studied composition with David Garner, Paul Salerni, Steven Sametz, David Conte, and Bill Warfield. His conducting mentors include Malcolm Merriweather and Mark Shapiro, and he has taken additional lessons with William Weinert, Vince Peterson, Matthew Oltman, and Steven Sametz. In his copious free time, Bryan enjoys rock climbing and captains his intramural softball team.