Ray Seol

Dr. Ray Seol is an assistant professor of professional music and a distinguished jazz bassist and producer with extensive involvement in the New York jazz scene. During his undergraduate years at the New School’s School of Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York City, he studied under renowned bassists Reggie Workman and Buster Williams. This period marked the inception of his journey to define his musical identity and formulate his unique concept of jazz.

Dr. Seol’s capacity to synthesize sound and color through synesthesia laid the groundwork for his innovative approach to sonic visualization, a theory he explored in his master’s thesis in music technology at New York University. Over time, he solidified this concept as a novel means of improvising and visually interpreting jazz, incorporating interactive technologies. His showcase titled Interactive Jazz: Jazz as a New Visual Art has garnered invitations to art galleries in both New York City and Seoul, South Korea. His recent interactive jazz creation, "Seu Aprendiz" (2021), which incorporates the interactive jazz concept along with a freshly introduced linguistic interpretation process, achieved the remarkable feat of ranking no. 1 on the Roots Music Report’s Top 50 World Song Chart and no. 2 on the North American College and Community Radio Chart.

Dr. Seol harbors a deep commitment to advocating for sustainable career platforms, particularly for immigrant artists. He gleaned insights into the prevailing societal biases against immigrant artists while conducting interviews for his second master’s thesis in the arts administration program at Columbia University and his doctoral dissertation work at Northeastern University.

Since 2007, Dr. Seol has released four studio jazz albums and individual tracks, further participating in numerous domestic and international tours and jazz festivals. He has collaborated with distinguished jazz luminaries like Jason Moran, Marta Gómez, Scott Robinson, Art Hirahara, and Takuya Kuroda. Additionally, he contributed to the production of the Latin Grammy–nominated album Yeah Won, marking the first-ever nomination for a Korean album in the Música Popular Brasileira category.