PRESS

Photo by Emra Islek

Comfort Girl - CANADIAN PREMIERE - Sax Player Stephanie Chou Holding Special International Women’s Day Performance at BPAC - Mar 2024

Atlanta Contemporary Ensemble uses Seagulls in SoundNow Festival - Video of art+music+dance, review in Earrelevant - Jan 2024

Boston Public Radio - WGBH - TamaleDumpling excerpt - White Snake Projects Let’s Celebrate promo - Nov 2023

OperaWire - White Snake Projects Let’s Celebrate 2 - premiere of TamaleDumpling - Oct 2023

Chamber Music America announces 2023 Grantees - Comfort Girl album recording receives an Artistic Projects grant - download press release - 2023

Lower Manhattan Cultural Council - Creative Engagement Grantee 2023

Jade Star Hotel receives a 2022 MAP Fund - press release - Dec 2022

Jade Star Hotel - MAP Fund Announces $2.6 million in Artist Grants - Dec 2022

Sigma Xi STEM Art and Film Festival - Asymptote wins Best in Performing Arts - November 2022

OPERA America Commissioning Grant winner for Jade Star Hotel - OPERA America Awards $100,000 to Support Opera by Women at Seven Opera Companies - press release - Aug 2022

OPERA America Commissioning Grant winner Jade Star Hotel - Broadway World press release - Aug 2022

“Dreamy Stephanie Chou” at Joe’s Pub fall 2022 - Broadway World - Aug 2022

The City Life, and NJ Stage press announcements - Aug 2022

AOP Mixtape at Joe’s Pub - Broadway World - Feb 2022

Comfort Girl awarded a New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) commissioning grant, in development into a chamber opera with The American Opera Project - press release - December 2021

Broadway World press release - December 2021

Opera Wire press release - December 2021

Millennial Woman is Songs for Social Change 2021 Finalist - Renaissance Artists and Writers Association

Sigma Xi virtual STEM Art and Film Festival - Continuum Hypothesis wins Best in Performing Arts and the People’s Choice Award in Performing Arts - November 2021

Nippertown Review of Performance at Jazz at the Lake, Lake George NY - September 2021

Manhattan Beat - “ Free Summer Concerts in Glorious NYC Open-Air Locations” - Little Island - 2021

Little Island Storytelling Festival - Times Square Chronicles, Broadway World, Playbill, American Theatre - July 2021

Together apART: Creating During COVID | ArtsWestchester exhibition feat. Millennial Woman - May 2021

42nd annual AAPI Heritage Festival - Coalition of Asian Pacific Americans - May 2021 - video

I Care If You Listen - ListN Up Playlist - April 2021

Lower Manhattan Cultural Council - Creative Engagement grantee - 2021

OPERA America New Works Exploration Grantee - 2021

Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship Finalist - 2021 (PDF press release)

New York Music Daily - “Potent Relevance and Inspiration From Stephanie Chou” Millennial Woman - 2021

The New Yorker - Comfort Girl in Joe’s Pub LIVE! from the Archives - 2020

Broadway World - Comfort Girl in Joe’s Pub LIVE! from the Archives - 2020

Times Square Chronicles - Comfort Girl in Joe’s Pub LIVE! from the Archives - 2020

iSING! 2020 Composition Competition Finalist - 2020

Interview - FrostFoward Creativity interview - 2020

DownBeat - “Stephanie Chou’s Suite Examines Dark History” Profile and Review of Comfort Girl at Joe’s Pub - 2019 online edition (full article)

DownBeat - “The Beat” Review of Comfort Girl at Joe’s Pub - 2019 print edition

New York Music Daily - Review of Comfort Girl at Joe’s Pub “A Rare City Park Show and a Mighty, Harrowing New Suite From Stephanie Chou” - 2019

McDonald’s APA Legacy Public Service Campaign - Asian Pacific Islander American Heritage Month - 2019

New York Music Daily - Review of Asymptote “Stephanie Chou Unveils Her Powerful, Socially Relevant New Suite”- 2019

Comfort Girl Press Release (English) - 2019

New York Music Daily - “Stephanie Chou’s Chinese Jazz Shifts the Paradigm at Lincoln Center” - Review of Lincoln Center performance - 2018

ZealNYC Jazz Notes Intel - Review of Lincoln Center performance “Stephanie Chou Digs Into Her Cultural Heritage” - 2018

Lincoln Center "The Score" Interview and Article - 2018

Global Music Awards - Silver Medal - Dec 2017

All About Jazz Download of the Day - 2017

Queens Public TV - Segment from Global Mashups at Flushing Town Hall - 2017 - TV

Columbia College Today article - 2017

American Composers Forum Article - “Steph Chou Makes a Smooth Transition from Jazz Saxophone to Multicultural Bliss on Last Year’s Asymptote” - 2017

Sinovision English - TV segment and interview - 2017 - TV

Beyond Chinatown Article - 2017

Spotlight in Taiwanese American Professionals - 2017

Chinamerica Radio Station - interview - 2017 (scroll to 4/9/17 airdate) - AUDIO

Rivertowns Enterprise Article - 2017

Sinovision - feature TV segment and interview on Asymptote (Chinese)- 2017 - TV

World Journal - Asymptote (Chinese) - 2016

Columbia University Music Department - Asymptote - 2016

Asymptote Press Release (English) - 2016 Asymptote Press Release (Chinese) - 2016

Jerome Fund for New Music (JFund) 2016 Awardee - American Composers Forum

China Institute - Asymptote Release Concert at Joe's Pub - 2016

Summer on the Hudson - Make Some Noise Festival - 2016

Premiere of “C for G Ballet” at Goucher College in Maryland - 2012

Sinovision - feature segment from Prime Knot release concert - 2011 (Chinese) - TV

World Journal - Chinese Press Release - 2011  Columbia Spectator Article - 2011


One of New York’s most socially relevant and ambitious jazz talents...”

”A Mighty, Harrowing New Suite... a phanstasmagorical song cycle...”

”What was most striking about the show was not only Chou’s ability to shift between musical styles, but her prowess as a lyricist.
— New York Music Daily, 5/16/19, from a review of Stephanie Chou's world premiere of "Comfort Girl" show at Joe's Pub at the Public, "A Rare City Park Show and a Mighty, Harrowing New Suite from Stephanie Chou"

It is a stunning work that not only shines light on a dark chapter of history but also feels inspirational for contemporary listeners.
— DownBeat Magazine, July 2019, "Stephanie Chou's Suite Examines Dark History"; review from Comfort Girl premiere at Joe's Pub at the Public Theater, NYC

What makes Stephanie Chou’s music so much more interesting than most jazz these days? It’s a lot more tuneful, it’s often very playful, draws frequently on Chinese themes from over the centuries, and Chou isn’t afraid to take all this and rock out sometimes.”

”She’s a double threat, on the horn and the mic: she has a bright, edgy tone on the alto sax and sings in a soulful mezzo-soprano in both English and Chinese...”

”It’s a shock this album has slipped so far under the radar up to now.
— New York Music Daily, 3/22/19, from a review of Chou's CD "Asymptote", "Stephanie Chou Unveils Her Powerful, Socially Relevant New Suite"

…she [Chou] hit upon a novel expression for her sax—and her vocals—by embracing her Chinese heritage and using its musical folk and pop legacy to create a unique blend of traditional Chinese, classical and jazz. She showcased this superbly at Lincoln Center’s David Rubenstein Atrium on Thursday, March 8 to a full house.”

“With her exquisite arrangements, she [Chou] led her quartet, including the standout of the evening string and erhu player Andy Lin…on a rousing and lyrical set focused on her impressive album Asymptote.”

“What was so remarkable about Chou’s performance was its tasty diversity of styles....
— Music critic Dan Ouellette, ZEALnyc; from his review of Stephanie Chou’s show at the David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center, March 8, 2018.

Chou is a strong singer with an unadorned mezzo-soprano, a strong saxophonist and a brilliantly individualistic composer who’s shifting the paradigm, blending Chinese themes from over the centuries with jazz, classical and more than a little rock in places... Her music is relevant, and lyrical, and amazingly eclectic...”

”...Penelope, a haunting, crescendoing backbeat rock ballad fueled by Lin’s aching viola and a spiraling, smoky sax solo. It would have been a huge radio hit for an artsy band like the Alan Parsons Project thirty years ago.”

”Making Tofu ... a moody jazz waltz with a gorgeous, sternly crescendoing meteor shower of a piano solo and ominously modal sax work. Who knew so much energy was required to make those innocuous little cubes!
— New York Music Daily, 3/9/2018, from a review of Stephanie Chou's show at the David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center, "Stephanie Chou’s Chinese Jazz Shifts the Paradigm at Lincoln Center"

Stephanie Chou’s musical style was one of the most diverse I have heard. A triple threat being a composer, singer, and alto saxophonist, she led her unconventional band [...] through ballads, Chinese pop/folk songs, her own pop songs about as diverse topics as advanced mathematics and unanswered letters as well as excerpts from her opera on Japanese atrocities toward Korean and Chinese women during WW2.

Most touching was her sharing with us her experience growing up as a Chinese American with a song about the tough job of making tofu and a tongue twister about eating grapes that were rhythmically recited in a highly original fashion. [...] Chou’s tone on the saxophone was sometimes unique, resembling that of a Chinese woodwind instrument. Tones that Charlie Parker never would have heard or thought of creating. Yes, the music does evolve.
— Rudy Lu, Nippertown; from his review of performance LIVE: Lake George Jazz Festival (Day Two), September 19, 2021

Stephanie Chou is a genuine triple-threat in the music business. A multi-instrumentalist, she plays alto saxophone and piano at the level of virtuosity, and also sings in an expressive, highly personable manner with a wide range. Chou’s work challenges expectations and defies categorization, but its brilliance in terms of conceptualization and performance makes the music compelling and wholly enjoyable listening. The emotions in her soundscapes are real threads of the human drama.

Simply exquisite, the instrumentalists and Chou’s vocals [are] placed perfectly in the arrangements to create an unmistakable mood.
— The Gazette, 8/18/16, Thomas Staudter

Steph Chou’s Prime Knot is as impressive a musical debut as it is intellectually challenging - a project born from the notion that the pristine beauty of pure mathematics (Chou’s primary area of study at Columbia University) can reflect and inform the immutability of musical inspiration. Using a simple Chinese melody as a recurring theme, Chou constructs an album packed with smart, hip arrangements, played with lively precision and marked confidence. It says a lot that she was to recruit such a talented group of players to help her bring her music to life - pianist Jeremy Siskind, trumpeter Marcus Printup, and drummer Ronen Itzik especially. It says even more that Prime Knot is her first effort - an unlikely treasure from a relative unknown that can stand next to most recent jazz releases.
— Ashley Kahn, author of A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album, Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece, and other titles. He teaches music history and journalism at New York University.