Korean native
Okkyung Lee began her career as an experimental cellist with classical training, eventually expanding into fields of improvisation, noise, jazz, and extended technique.
Lee has collaborated with many of the bigger names in the noise and experimental improvisation scenes, including performances and recording dates with standout artists like
Nels Cline,
Ikue Mori,
Laurie Anderson, and
John Zorn. While solo releases such as
Ghil (2013) capture the chaotic aggression of her performances, she has also composed more delicate, reflective chamber works such as 2020's Yeo-Neun.
Originally from South Korea,
Lee moved to Boston in 1993. She attended the Berklee College of Music, where she graduated with a dual bachelor's degree in Contemporary Writing & Production and Film Scoring in 1998, then earned a master's degree in Contemporary Improvisation from the New England Conservatory of Music in 2000. She relocated to New York City and began recording and performing with a wide variety of improvisers, composers, and rock groups, including
Assif Tsahar, Butch Morris, and
Raz Mesinai (
Badawi). Her first album, Nihm, was released by
John Zorn's Tzadik in 2005; featured musicians included
Ikue Mori,
Trevor Dunn, and
Sylvie Courvoisier. She also collaborated with experimental turntablist
Christian Marclay on a split album with Italian improv duo
My Cat Is an Alien.
Lee's solo LP I Saw the Ghost of an Unknown Soul and It Said... appeared on
Thurston Moore's Ecstatic Peace! in 2008.
In 2010,
Lee received a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grant, which allowed her to tour and collaborate with musicians abroad. She released the Tzadik-issued Noisy Love Songs and worked with artists such as
Phil Minton,
Evan Parker, and
Anla Courtis. In 2013, her abrasive solo album
Ghil, recorded by
Lasse Marhaug and edited down from hours of improvisations, was released by
Stephen O'Malley's Ideologic Organ imprint.
Lee also worked with
Marhaug and
C. Spencer Yeh on the Software-issued
Wake Up Awesome. Additionally, she curated the 27th edition of the Music Unlimited Festival in Wels, Austria, with the tagline "The Most Beautiful Noise in the World." Subsequent collaborations with artists such as
Mark Fell,
Chris Corsano, and
Bill Orcutt were released.
Lee was granted a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award in 2015. She held residencies at Civitella Ranieri in Umbria, Italy, and Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, Germany, and toured with
Swans in 2016.
Amalgam, a further collaboration with
Marclay, was released by
Northern Spy that year.
Lee issued several albums in 2018: Dahl-Tah-Ghi (Pica Disk) was recorded live at the Emanuel Vigelang Mausoleum in Oslo in 2013. The Tzadik-issued Cheol-Kkot-Sae (Steel.Flower.Bird) is a long-form collaborative piece combining noise and improvisation with Korean traditional music. The Air Around Her is a collaboration with drone artist and long-string instrument master
Ellen Fullman, and Speckled Stones and Dissonant Green Dots incorporates computer-generated and analog synthesizer sounds.
In 2020, Shelter Press issued
Lee's chamber quartet work Yeo-Neun, which became one of her most acclaimed releases.
Lee's piece "Teum (The Silvery Slit)" appeared on a split-LP with
Hecker, issued by Portraits GRM in 2021. ~ Paul Simpson & Fred Thomas