How did we get here?
What keeps us here?
Is this home?
These are the questions Sulwyn Lok's music keeps returning to — the ones we live inside but rarely say aloud.
A composer and music director moving between Singapore and New York, Sulwyn writes for the charged space between things that don't usually meet: Chinese instruments and Western orchestras, tradition and electronics, the people we were and the people we're becoming. The aim is never to melt those differences into something seamless, but to find the space where they strain toward each other and almost — but never quite — touch. That reaching is the music.
Sulwyn rarely lets the questions resolve, because the belief is that they don't. A symphonic poem prays for a peace it admits may never come. A concerto insists that identity is never finished — that we are always mid-step, mid-becoming. A guzheng traces the shape of an old wound, then learns to look at it with new eyes, ending not in answers but in something more honest: the willingness to hold what cannot yet be understood. Even at its most exuberant — a city's frantic, kiasu pulse; a festive dance spun from an old melody — there is a tenderness underneath, a love letter folded into the noise.
Because in the end, that is what music is for. Not to answer the questions, but to build a shared room we can step into briefly, together, and feel what is otherwise too large, or too unspoken, to face alone.
Cannes Film Festival • Busan International Film Festival • Hermès • New York State Council on the Arts • Singapore Chinese Orchestra • Singapore Symphony Orchestra
Sulwyn Lok is a composer and music director whose work has been described as “magical” and filled with “plenty of beautiful sounds to savour” (The Straits Times). Based between Singapore and New York, his music draws from a global palette — from orchestras and traditional Chinese instruments to voice and synthesizers — with a focus on cultural connection and narrative resonance.
He composed the music for the opening of Hermès’ On the Wings of Hermès exhibition, creating an immersive live experience that journeyed from Baroque elegance to whimsical marching band spectacle. His work also includes projects for Samsung and films premiering at Cannes and Busan, and has been recognized by Universal Music (UCompose) and the National Youth Film Awards. Spanning concert hall, theatre, and screen, his commissions include the Singapore Chinese Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, and the arts councils of both New York and Singapore.
Signature projects include Here, Hear — a museum-based piece on Asian New Yorker identity; Morning of the World — a multimedia meditation on renewal; and Waves, Towards the Lands We Call Home — a symphonic prayer shaped by early Chinese migration. His concerto cycle Into the Moonlit Yonder, written for Chinese wind and percussion instruments (吹打乐), explores longing, sanctuary, and transformation.
Sulwyn is also passionate about inclusion and education. He has led music workshops for Afghan refugees in Indonesia, works closely with The Purple Symphony (Singapore’s largest inclusive orchestra), and teaches regularly across Southeast Asia.
He holds a Master’s in Screen Scoring from New York University (Singapore Digital Scholar) and was valedictorian at NUS YST Conservatory. He is the resident composer for the Singapore Ruan Ensemble and Reverberance, and co-founded Poco Productions, the Southeast Asia Music Academy Online, and the Victoria Chinese Orchestra.