Aiyana Braun (b. 1997) is a composer and sound artist described by PBS as "groundbreaking" and "explosive yet also meditative." Her work explores the dynamic interplay between groove-oriented and ametric material, reflecting a deep fascination with sonic phenomena and the field of psychoacoustics.

Her music has been performed across the US and internationally by ensembles such as the New York Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Berkeley Symphony, and has been featured on NPR's From the Top, PBS's On Stage at Curtis, and I Care if You Listen.TV. She has received honors from the ASCAP Foundation, BMI Foundation, American Composers Forum, Copland House, and NYU's Center for Ballet and the Arts. At age eleven, she was commissioned by Norman Lear and Maya Angelou to perform an original composition at the Marian Anderson Awards, after which Maya Angelou expressed that Aiyana's composition "touched me deeply." Shortly after, at the age of fifteen, she was commissioned to write her first orchestral work for the New York Philharmonic.

She has since worked with orchestras including the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in a workshop led by John Adams, Berkeley Symphony (as part of a two-year residency mentored by Anna Clyne through the League of American Orchestras and New Music USA's Music Alive program), Orkest de Ereprijs (Netherlands), San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, and Curtis Symphony Orchestra, among others. She frequently collaborates with choreographers, dancers, and visual artists, and was an International Fellow in Residence at NYU's Center for Ballet and the Arts.

Aiyana is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music (B.M., Full Scholarship), The Juilliard School's Pre-College Division (Full Scholarship, Four Years) and the University of Southern California (M.M., Full Scholarship). Her primary mentors include Pulitzer and Grammy-winning composer Jennifer Higdon, Pulitzer Prize finalist and Grammy-winning composer Ted Hearne, and David Serkin Ludwig, Dean and Director of Music at The Juilliard School.

Aiyana Braun (b. 1997) is a composer and sound artist described by PBS as "groundbreaking" and "explosive yet also meditative." Her work explores the dynamic interplay between groove-oriented and ametric material, reflecting a deep fascination with sonic phenomena and the field of psychoacoustics.

Her music has been performed across the US and internationally by ensembles such as the New York Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, and has been featured on NPR's From the Top, PBS's On Stage at Curtis, and I Care if You Listen.TV. She has received honors from the ASCAP Foundation, BMI Foundation, American Composers Forum, Copland House, and NYU's Center for Ballet and the Arts.

At age eleven, Aiyana was commissioned by Norman Lear ("All in the Family," "The Jeffersons") and Maya Angelou to perform an original composition at the Marian Anderson Awards, an event featuring Broadway veteran Ben Vereen, Grammy Award winner Harry Belafonte, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Maya Angelou expressed afterward that Aiyana's composition "touched me deeply." Shortly after, at the age of fifteen, she was commissioned to write her first orchestral work for the New York Philharmonic.

She has since worked with orchestras including the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in a workshop led by John Adams, Berkeley Symphony (as part of a two-year residency mentored by Anna Clyne through the League of American Orchestras and New Music USA's Music Alive program), Orkest de Ereprijs (Netherlands), San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Curtis Symphony Orchestra, and Orchestra VOX (in residence at Oxford University), among others. She has written music for artists including Daniel Matsukawa, Principal Bassoonist of the Philadelphia Orchestra; Eric Bartlett, Cellist at the New York Philharmonic; and Jon Deak, Associate Principal Bass of the New York Philharmonic, as well as musicians from the Boston Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, and New York City Ballet Orchestra.

Both of Aiyana's parents were professional dancers and choreographers, and the influence of dance is evident in her collaborative work. She was commissioned by the Curtis Institute of Music to write a short ballet for the Rock School (featured in the Sundance documentary First Position) and was an International Fellow in Residence at NYU's Center for Ballet and the Arts from 2020 to 2021, where Aiyana was a part of a cohort of 12 that also included Alvin Ailey's resident choreographer Jamar Roberts and the Royal New Zealand Ballet's Sarah Foster-Sproull. During her residency, she collaborated with dancers from Ballet X, choreographers from New York City Ballet, and musicians from Juilliard.

Aiyana is also a passionate educator. She is an Adjunct Professor at Westminster Choir College of Rider University, where she designs and teaches graduate theory and music perception courses, including Psychoacoustics and Analysis of Seminal Works of the Last 15 Years, in which students analyzed compositions commissioned and/or recorded by the college's Grammy-winning conductor Donald Nally and The Crossing. She also teaches undergraduate Musicianship (a consolidation of music theory, ear training, and keyboard studies), Post-Tonal Theory, Songwriting, and Music & Society. At Raritan Valley Community College she teaches Audio Production, a course she designed that covers recording, miking, and editing techniques, and working with MIDI and DAWs for composition, songwriting, and multimedia. She was previously a Lecturer at California State University, Fullerton, where she taught Composition lessons to graduate students, as well as Theory, Orchestration, Composition, Ear Training, and 20th/21st-Century Composition Techniques/Post-Tonal Theory. Earlier, she taught composition at the New York Philharmonic's Very Young Composers Program alongside Pulitzer-finalist Mary Kouyoumdjian and Angélica Negrón.

Aiyana is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music (B.M., Full Scholarship), The Juilliard School's Pre-College Division (Full Scholarship, Four Years), and the University of Southern California (M.M., Full Scholarship), where she studied composition with Ted Hearne, psychoacoustics with Rome Prize winner and Guggenheim Fellow Nina Young, and music production with Jae Deal (credits include Charli XCX's Brat, Snoop Dogg, Lady Gaga, and Wynton Marsalis). She has also participated in lessons or masterclasses with Kaija Saariaho, John Adams, Unsuk Chin, Chen Yi, Libby Larsen, Caroline Shaw, Derek Bermel, Christopher Theofanidis, Anna Clyne, Augusta Read Thomas, and others. Her primary mentors include Pulitzer and Grammy-winning composer Jennifer Higdon, Pulitzer Prize finalist and Grammy-winning composer Ted Hearne, and David Serkin Ludwig, Dean and Director of Music at The Juilliard School.