Composer and violinist Layale Chaker was raised on the verge of multiple musical streams in her native Lebanon. Chaker’s sound world, described by NPR as “beguiling” with “bright and beautiful strands… gorgeous, wine-dark swirls,” lies at the intersection of classical contemporary music, jazz, Arabic music, and improvisation. Her practice approaches art as both sanctuary and crossroads, where ancestral narratives meet contemporary voices in a continuous reimagination of the world we inherit and shape.

Her recent projects include the premiere of Qarar/Jawab, an evening-length solo work commissioned by the Venice Biennale, and the commission and premiere of her double concerto Dawning with the New York Philharmonic, Nebraska Crossroads Music Festival, and Lincoln’s Symphony Orchestra, composed and performed alongside Kinan Azmeh. Her debut chamber opera, Ruinous Gods, received its world premiere at the 2024 Spoleto Festival, weaving mythic elements and fairy-tale fragments into a 21st-century fantasia on displacement and the psychological toll borne by children. She has also released a new double portrait album on In a Circle Records, featuring her chamber works performed by the ETHEL Quartet and another disc with her jazz-chamber ensemble, Sarafand.

She began her musical training at the National Higher Conservatory of Beirut before pursuing advanced studies at the Conservatoire de Paris and the Royal Academy of Music in London. Chaker’s honors include the Opera America Discovery Award, Jerome Hill Fellowship, Prix International Nadia et Lili Boulanger, Ruth Anderson Competition, Diaphonique Franco-British Commission Prize, and the Royal Academy of Music Guinness Award.