Paul Gabriel L. Cosme

Filipino composer Paul Gabriel L. Cosme blends and breaks boundaries in narrating stories of home, loss, and recovery through sound and scholarship. As a composer, Paul syncretizes forms and sounds from Pacific Asian and Western traditions. He also improvises and performs his works with jazz, ethnic, and traditional artists and ensembles from Chicago, New York, the Twin Cities, Germany, and the Philippines. As a scholar, Paul investigates Filipino national culture(s)–from folk, “high” art, to pop–in the 20th and 21st centuries. His current project traces developments in Original Pilipino Music and national identity. Paul is pursuing an MM in Composition at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa as a Graduate Degree Fellow at the East-West Center. Before, he studied composition and counterpoint with Randy Bauer and Victoria Malawey. Paul loves dogs, the morning dew, Beethoven op. 132, Pinoy indie music, mangoes, Haruki Murakami, and his favorite Filipino dish—sinigang.