Julia Riew
Julia Riew | |
|---|---|
| Alma mater | Harvard University |
| Years active | 2018-present |
Julia Riew is an American composer-lyricist, librettist, songwriter, and novelist.
Early life and education
[edit | edit source]Riew is a third generation Korean-American who grew up in St. Louis, Missouri.[1][2] She was involved with music from a young age, starting violin lessons at age 4. She began writing music at age 7, and had written a musical of her own by age 15.[3] While in school, she was a member of the St. Louis Children's Choirs[4] and the Arch City Kids Theater Troupe, which put on cabarets to raise money for juvenile diabetes.[2] Her family later moved to New York City and then Connecticut.[5]
She attended Harvard University. Although initially in a pre-med program, she graduated in May 2022 with a concentration in Theater, Dance, and Media and Music.[1][6][7] While there, she was a founding member of the Asian Students Arts Project.[2]
Musical theater
[edit | edit source]College work
[edit | edit source]Riew wrote her first college musical, Hitched, in 2018.[7] In April 2019, East Side, a student-produced musical Riew co-wrote about a Chinese-American family dealing with gentrification in New York City, premiered at Harvard's Farkas Hall.[8] After seeing the show, the American Repertory Theater (ART) commissioned Riew to write two family oriented shows: Thumbelina: A Little Musical, which premiered in December 2019 at the Loeb Center, and Jack and the Beanstalk: A Musical Adventure.[2] In June 2022 she premiered Alice's Wonderland at the Coterie Theater in Kansas City, Missouri, a show she co-wrote with J. Quinton Johnson.[7]
Dive
[edit | edit source]For her senior thesis, Riew began developing a musical inspired by the Korean folktale Shimcheong and her own experiences with Korean-American identity.[9][10] In January 2022 she shared some of her music on TikTok, where as of August 2024 she had a following of 135,000 users and 3.5 million likes.[1][6] Shimcheong: A Folktale was later renamed to Dive. Riew put on her thesis in February and March 2022 on Harvard's campus.[6] In February 2023 Riew performed several of her songs as part of Playbill's Songwriter Series.[11]
In April 2023 ART announced they would further develop Dive with the help of Riew, Diana Son, and Diane Paulus.[1][12]
Upcoming projects
[edit | edit source]Other upcoming projects include her musical ENDLESS (dir. by Zi Alikhan, premiering in Korea).[13]
Writing
[edit | edit source]In July 2025, Riew published the YA fantasy novel The Last Tiger, which was co-written with her brother, Brad Riew.[13] The novel was inspired by the story of their grandparents' romance in Japanese-occupied Korea.[13] The novel entered The New York Times Best Seller list at number five.[14]
She plans to release a Middle Grade fantasy novel, Shimcheong , with Harper Collins in summer 2026.[15]
Awards
[edit | edit source]- 2022 Fred Ebb Award[16]
References
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External links
[edit | edit source]- 2000s births
- 21st-century American composers
- 21st-century American women musicians
- 21st-century American women writers
- American librettists
- American lyricists
- American musicians of Korean descent
- American TikTokers
- American women songwriters
- American writers of Korean descent
- Harvard University alumni
- Songwriters from Missouri
- Writers from St. Louis
- Living people
- 21st-century American novelists
- 21st-century American women novelists
- American novelists of Asian descent
- American young adult novelists