About

Known for his compelling, expressive and intransigent music, Puerto Rican composer Julio Elvin Quiñones (b. 1996) writes works that are imbued with visceral gestures, intuition and relentless poetic vibrancy. 

His music has been performed by ensembles like the Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico’s Symphony Orchestra and Concert Band, the Omnibus Ensemble, the JACK Quartet, loadbang, Ensemble Dal Niente, Talea Ensemble, Tacet[i] Ensemble, and Ekmeles; additionally, he’s also been performed by soloists: James Alexander, Hakeem Davison, Katherine Needleman, Joseph Staten, Alyson Kane, Christopher Agnew, and Athos Maelstrom.

Recent residencies include those in festivals such as Divergent Studio 2021, DePaul Summer New Music Residency 2021, New Music on the Point 2021. In 2023 he was selected as Composer-In-Residence for the Massachusetts International Festival of the Arts 2023-2024 Puerto Abierto Residency with the Victory Players. He was a 2024-2025 Storyteller in Residence for Telltale Theatre Opera’s Sandbox Series, where they commissioned and premiered his monodrama This. Is. You. Are.

Julio studied composition at the Conservatorio de Música de Puerto Rico with composer/pianist Alfonso Fuentes (B.M.); moved on to study with Michael Hersch at the Johns Hopkins University Peabody Institute, where he was awarded a 2021-2022 Randolph S. and Amalie Rothschild Scholarship, (M.M.) and is currently pursuing doctoral studies at The Graduate Center CUNY, where he was awarded both a Graduate Center Fellowship and a Provost’s Enhancement Fellowship. The research for his dissertation Componer en Puertorriqueño: Puerto Rican art music and the use of cultural signifiers as performance of identity was awarded the 2025-2026 Crossing Latinidades Mellon Fellowship.