Hesam Abedini

Hesam Abedini, PhD

Faculty - Adjunct
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Adjunct Instructor - Music History
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Hesam Abedini is an Iranian-American performer, composer, improviser, educator, producer, and filmmaker residing in Irvine, California. His work crosses the boundaries between idioms as wide as Western contemporary music, classical Persian music, free improvisation, and computer music. He is the founding member of the Sibarg, an intercultural creative music ensemble that combines traditional Persian music and Jazz. Hesam’s music have been performed by various musicians and ensembles such as, the JACK Quartet, selected members of the Atlas Ensemble, Del Sol Quartet, Loadbang, Miolina, Eclipse Quartet, New Mexico Contemporary Ensemble, Amalgama Ensemble, Sunflower, and Mark Dresser’s Bass Ensemble. He is the winner of the New Mexico Contemporary Ensemble’s 2nd Annual Call for Scores in 2018.

Since 2011, under the supervision of Dr. Hossein Omoumi, Hesam has researched on classical Persian music and directed the NEA and Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute-sponsored Documentary film “From Isfahan to Irvine”. His film has been screened and archived in the Library of Congress, and UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive. Hesam is a graduate of the Tehran Music Conservatory and holds his B.A. in Music Composition with honors from the University of California, San Diego. He studied music composition with Lei Liang, Chinary Ung, Anthony Davis and improvisation with Mark Dresser.

In 2020, Hesam completed a PhD in Integrated Composition, Improvisation and Technology (ICIT) at the University of California, Irvine as a Roshan and Provost PhD Fellow under the supervision of Prof. Christopher Dobrian.

  • PhD Integrated Composition, Improvisation and Technology (ICIT), University of California, Irvine
  • BA Music Composition with the highest honors, University of California, San Diego
  • Diploma in Piano Performance, Tehran Music Conservatory, Iran
  • Introduction to World Music
  • Intersection of Persian music and African-American Music
  • Music of Iranian Diaspora
  • Computer Music and Cultural Fairness
  • "Intercultural Music in Iran and Diaspora" A book chapter by Hesam Abedini Music and Society of Modern Iran, edited by N. Siamdoust and H. Chahabi, 2023 Publication: Ilex, distributed by Harvard Univ. Press.
  • Circadian Etudes, An album of open improvisation by The Assembly For Distance Alchemy, 2022
  • Kooch-e Khamân, String quartets by Iranian composers for Del Sol String Quartet, 2021 Acknowledgments: #5 on Billboard’s Classical Music Chart
  • Ode to Love, An album by Namâd Ensemble, 2020
  • Cipher, Iranian/Jazz music by Sibarg Ensemble, 2018
  • From Isfahan to Irvine, Documentary movie on classical Persian music, 2016 Directed by Hesam Abedini A National Endowment for the Arts project.
  • Adjunct Faculty in Music History, Soka University of America, 2022-present
  • Associate Faculty in Music, Saddleback College, 2020-2022
  • Teaching Associate in Music, University of California, Irvine, 2020-2021
  • Elahé Omidyar Mir-Djalali Fellowship for Excellence in Persian Studies, 2021-2022
  • UCI Division of Teaching Excellence and Innovation (DTEI) Summer Fellowship, 2020-2021
  • The Farrell Prize, 2017
  • The Bertram Turetzky Award, 2016