Johan Lenox
- Composer
- Music Department
- Actor
Johan Lenox is a singer, composer, and music producer, whose work spans the classical, film and musical theater worlds, as well as a career as a solo artist and a collaborator of rappers and pop stars. Many of his projects are driven by a passion for turning mainstream audiences into lovers of classical music.
Initially trained as a classical composer (writing under his given name Stephen Feigenbaum), Lenox began composing music for orchestras and choirs at the age of 15, working with the Cincinnati Pops, Boston Pops, Albany Symphony, contemporary ensembles Ethel, JACK and Roomful of Teeth, and many others across the nation, on music which won him composition prizes from ASCAP and the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
He continued this work at Yale College, and later Yale School of Music, studying composition with Pulitzer Prize-winner David Lang and Tony Award-winner Jeanine Tesori, while touring the world in the a cappella group, The Whiffenpoofs. "Independents", a musical he wrote at Yale with collaborators Mark Sonnenblick and Marina Keegan, went on to be named a New York Times Critic's Pick and win "Best Overall Production" at the FringeNYC festival, in a 2012 production directed by eventual "The Plague" director Charlie Polinger.
Around that time, an LSD-fueled encounter with the music of Kanye West inspired Lenox to co-create Yeethoven, a 2016 orchestral concert in Los Angeles, interweaving and comparing the works of Kanye West and Beethoven, with arrangements by Lenox. The program was widely recognized in publications ranging from Pitchfork to Rolling Stone and USA Today, and was reprised at Lincoln Center in New York. This performance caught the attention of rap super-producers No I.D. and Mike Dean, beginning a long career for Johan as a composer and producer for West, Travis Scott, Teyana Taylor, Shawn Mendes, John Legend, Selena Gomez, A$AP Rocky, Rufus Wainwright, FINNEAS and many others.
As a solo artist, Lenox marries lush orchestral tracks with stacks of vocals as he sings about growing up in America during the end of the world. His third album, "Full Speed Nowhere," came out this fall, after a worldwide tour opening for his longtime collaborator 070 Shake, and features vocals from her and singer Kacy Hill, among others.
After several years pursuing separate paths, Lenox and Charlie Polinger reunited for Polinger's debut feature "The Plague". The score is composed almost entirely of Lenox's own heavily-layered vocals, which owe as much creatively to his time performing in a cappella groups as to his work with contemporary classical choirs. This aesthetic is dramatically contrasted by the 1960s-inspired Corsa Notturna, a sweepingly melodic vocal and orchestral song, with an ensemble conducted by Lenox, which plays in the first act of the film as well as over the credits.
Initially trained as a classical composer (writing under his given name Stephen Feigenbaum), Lenox began composing music for orchestras and choirs at the age of 15, working with the Cincinnati Pops, Boston Pops, Albany Symphony, contemporary ensembles Ethel, JACK and Roomful of Teeth, and many others across the nation, on music which won him composition prizes from ASCAP and the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
He continued this work at Yale College, and later Yale School of Music, studying composition with Pulitzer Prize-winner David Lang and Tony Award-winner Jeanine Tesori, while touring the world in the a cappella group, The Whiffenpoofs. "Independents", a musical he wrote at Yale with collaborators Mark Sonnenblick and Marina Keegan, went on to be named a New York Times Critic's Pick and win "Best Overall Production" at the FringeNYC festival, in a 2012 production directed by eventual "The Plague" director Charlie Polinger.
Around that time, an LSD-fueled encounter with the music of Kanye West inspired Lenox to co-create Yeethoven, a 2016 orchestral concert in Los Angeles, interweaving and comparing the works of Kanye West and Beethoven, with arrangements by Lenox. The program was widely recognized in publications ranging from Pitchfork to Rolling Stone and USA Today, and was reprised at Lincoln Center in New York. This performance caught the attention of rap super-producers No I.D. and Mike Dean, beginning a long career for Johan as a composer and producer for West, Travis Scott, Teyana Taylor, Shawn Mendes, John Legend, Selena Gomez, A$AP Rocky, Rufus Wainwright, FINNEAS and many others.
As a solo artist, Lenox marries lush orchestral tracks with stacks of vocals as he sings about growing up in America during the end of the world. His third album, "Full Speed Nowhere," came out this fall, after a worldwide tour opening for his longtime collaborator 070 Shake, and features vocals from her and singer Kacy Hill, among others.
After several years pursuing separate paths, Lenox and Charlie Polinger reunited for Polinger's debut feature "The Plague". The score is composed almost entirely of Lenox's own heavily-layered vocals, which owe as much creatively to his time performing in a cappella groups as to his work with contemporary classical choirs. This aesthetic is dramatically contrasted by the 1960s-inspired Corsa Notturna, a sweepingly melodic vocal and orchestral song, with an ensemble conducted by Lenox, which plays in the first act of the film as well as over the credits.
