Alum

Xiao’an Li

Assistant Professor

Affiliated Departments

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Xiao’an Li is a Singaporean composer who has served top game developers, international brands, performing artists, and advertising agencies.

He was an invited adjudicator at the 2024 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity alongside representatives from Ogilvy, MassiveMusic, YouTube, and Amazon. Additionally, he ran East Coast Scoring from 2014-2019, where he employed up to 100 musicians every year, providing orchestra contracting services in Boston.

Career Highlights

Coproduced "Heaven and Earth Dragon" for artist Wang Leehom, for the 600th anniversary of the Forbidden City in China
Musical collaborations with the Baháʼí community, including "Martyrdom of The Bab" by Keivan Towfigh and Home of Light and "Our Story Is One" by Luke Slott
Provided game audio services to Tencent Games, Ubisoft, PLAYSTUDIOS (primary audio provider for myVEGAS flagship product with more than 90 million players) and others
Provided advertising music services to Ferrero, GlaxoSmithKline, Samsung, Meta, Pan Pacific Hotels, Supercell, and more
Composer for Longleaf Valley by TreesPlease Games, a game about conservation which has contributed to reforestation by planting more than 2 million trees

In Their Own Words

I hope to equip students with the skills and the mindset to survive for as long as possible in a career that is most often a war of attrition.

Often, what we consider to be important as musicians is very low on the list for someone who might be one of our clients—an advertiser, a game developer, a chief marketing officer, and so on. The more we are able to place ourselves in the mind space of those who pay us or have power over our careers, the better we will be at negotiating, self-advocacy, business development, and many other things that are essential for success.

I've had a very realistic middle-of-the-road career trajectory with diverse clientele and few to no true lucky breaks—I believe the practical wisdom I've gained along the way is something students will easily absorb and benefit from as they take their first tentative steps into the world.