Ilari Kaila is a Finnish-American composer who has written chamber, orchestral, vocal, and stage music. He joins the faculty of HKUST from New York where he has worked at Columbia University and Stony Brook University (State University of New York), teaching harmony, counterpoint, musicianship, and post-tonal music analysis, and as a teaching artist in composition with the New York Philharmonic. Kaila received his PhD in Music Composition in 2011 from Stony Brook University, New York, having previously studied at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki.  

His work has been presented by the MATA Festival in New York City, including the inaugural composer portrait concert in the MATA Continued series; as the Composer-in-Residence of the Chelsea Music Festival in New York and Taipei; at the American Music Festival in Albany; the Intimacy of Creativity in Hong Kong; the Metropolis Festival in Australia; the Banff Centre Summer Arts Festival in Canada; and the New York International Fringe Festival. Artists and ensembles Kaila has worked with include the Escher String Quartet, Aizuri Quartet, Tanglewood New Fromm Players, Alcott Trio, Kamus Quartet, Uusinta Ensemble, Hong Kong New Music Ensemble, Emil Holmström, Melinda Masur, Rachel Cheung, Olli Mustonen, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Avanti Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Albany Symphony Orchestra, Kuopio Symphony Orchestra, Joensuu Symphony Orchestra, Stony Brook Symphony Orchestra, and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra’s chamber ensembles. An album of Kaila’s chamber music, recorded by the Aizuri Quartet and pianist Adrienne Kim, was released on the Innova Recordings label in March 2020.