Leo Yablans is an award-winning composer and saxophonist. In his music, he seeks to create a dialogue between consonance and dissonance through improvisation and musical atmospheres to create a sound which represents emotions at their most raw. His compositions have been performed on three continents, recently at the 2022 São Paulo Contemporary Composers Festival, and as part of the Infuse Concert Series in Paris, France. He has been recognized for his pieces and overall achievement in music with awards from ASCAP, University of Oxford (Merton College), Hill’s Studio, and New York University, and was recently praised by The Oxford Blue for his “exquisite… brain-melting” original concert series with organist Owen Chan.

As a saxophonist, Leo has performed in some of America’s most renowned venues, such as the Beacon Theater, John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and MoMA New York City, has played alongside musicians such as Kwami Coleman, Alicia Waller, Ashnaa, Eric Gabriel, and Oxford University’s Merton College Choir.

Outside of music, Leo has recently completed a Master of Studies degree in English at University of Oxford (Merton College), where he composed a dissertation on Wagnerian aesthetics within the works of George Eliot and Oscar Wilde. He also graduated summa cum laude from NYU’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study in 2022, winning the school’s Léo Bronstein Homage Award in recognition of exceptional artistic and scholarly achievement.