Ethan A. Chaves

Biography

Ethan Antonio Chaves (b. 2003) is a violinist, violist, and composer based in Boston, MA. He studies at Harvard University and the New England Conservatory of Music through the dual-degree program, pursuing an A.B. in Music and Philosophy at Harvard and an M.M. in Composition at NEC. At Harvard, he is a senior in Winthrop House and serves as Artistic Director of Lowell House Opera, for which he is composing and writing the libretto for the company's 2026 production, No Exit, based on Jean-Paul Sartre's play.

Chaves's compositions have been performed by the MIVOS Quartet, Parker Quartet, Trio Immersio, New York Youth Symphony, Decoda Ensemble, and the Harvard Choruses, with premieres in Europe and the United States. Recent works include the hill wife for violin and cello (Avaloch Farm Institute), MIXED SIGNALS for the MIVOS Quartet (Valencia and Cambridge premieres), and No Exit, a chamber opera with electronics premiering in March 2026. Upcoming projects include Hagios for the Harvard Choruses New Music Initiative and a commissioned work for the Apollo Ensemble.

His orchestral works have been performed by the Juilliard Pre-College Orchestra, Harvard Pops Orchestra, and New York Youth Symphony. He has received awards including the Robert Levin Prize in Musical Performance, Blodgett Chamber Music Award, Artist Development Fellowship, and Bohemians Club Award for Composition, and recognition from the American Viola Society, Ensemble Altera, ASCAP, and the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra.

Chaves has appeared as both composer and soloist, including the 2025 premiere of his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra ("the broken seal—") with the Bach Society Orchestra. He has performed at venues including Alice Tully Hall, Sanders Theatre, and the Goethe-Institut Boston, and was featured on NPR's From the Top as recipient of the Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Award.

As an improviser, he has performed on viola and electronics at Harvard's Paine Hall and in Germany. His performance work CAN.space—for amplified soda cans and live electronics—was premiered at Harvard and later adapted for multiple versions. In 2025, he participated in Tyshawn Sorey's Autoschediasms at Darmstadt Ferienkurse.

Festival appearances include Darmstadt Ferienkurse, the Valencia International Music Festival, ICEBERG New Music Festival (Vienna), the Bowdoin International Music Festival, and the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, where he received the ASCAP Scholarship for Composition. His chamber cantata Unreal City (2021), based on T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land, was nominated for an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

He studies composition with Chaya Czernowin, Hans Tutschku, and Michael Gandolfi, and has studied privately with John Harbison, Eric Ewazen, and Julian Anderson CBE. His violin and viola teachers have included Malcolm Lowe, Li Lin, Naoko Tanaka, Joel Smirnoff, and Nicholas Cords, with masterclasses from Anne Akiko Meyers, Julia Fischer, and Kirill Troussov.

At Harvard, Chaves has served as Video Executive for The Harvard Crimson, concertmaster of the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra, co-principal violist of Brattle Street Chamber Players, and a member of the Signet Society. He is also Co-Founder and President of the Senza Sordino Foundation, a nonprofit supporting music programs for the verbally disabled community.