Ryan Tanaka was born and raised in Aiea, on the island of Oahu, Hawaii.  He has earned his BA in Composition/Theory from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and his MFA in the Performer/Composer program at the California Institute of the Arts. He is an active member of the International Society for Improvised Musics, American Composer's Forum, Los Angeles, and ASCAP.

As a composer, Ryan's music has been performed by ensembles such as the New Century Players, California EAR Unit, the Formalist Quartet, and has also composed several works for animated shorts produced at the California Institute of the Arts.  His music has also been featured in cultural events at the Japanese American National Museum and with the Okinawa Association of America.

As a performer, Ryan regularly performs with the A-Tribute Ensemble, an musical improv group that performs within a wide variety of idioms, ranging from classical, jazz, world, folk, and contemporary musical styles.  He has performed throughout the Greater Los Angeles area, including Redcat and the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

As a scholar, he has been active both as a music theorist and educator.  He has recently presented his paper "Phasing and Form" at the Second International Conference on Minimalism and is currently working on developing a pedagogical methodology within classical and non-idiomatic (e.g. free) improvisational practices.  (Improvisation Exercises for Musicians.)

His C.V. can be found here.