About
Who is Owen?
New York based Jazz guitarist
▎ Owen Chen is a New York-based jazz guitarist and bandleader of Eternal Wind. He holds a Master's in Jazz Performance from NYU, where he studied with John Scofield, Peter Bernstein, Ari Hoenig, and Adam Rogers. He records for Origin Records — his debut, The Ghibli Collection (2026), reimagines Joe Hisaishi through a post-bop and contemporary jazz lens. A violinist since age five, he brings a lyricism to the guitar that Jazz Weekly calls "Pat Metheny-esque… lyrical yet gently dancing." and Paris-Move describes as "one of those understated artists whose work carries a profound poetry, immediately accessible while remaining remarkably complex."
▎Owen leads and arranges for two projects. Eternal Wind, his contemporary jazz ensemble, reimagines popular film and game music and holds a frequently sold-out residency at Brooklyn's Red Pavilion running more than sixty nights. The ensemble's internationally critically acclaimed album has drawn press coverage from JazzWeekly, All About Jazz, BroadwayWorld, Paris-Move, and more. His straight-ahead Lunar Frontier quintet presents a concert series pairing the hard-bop canon — Gillespie, Monk, Blakey, Ellington — with the Yoko Kanno songbook it inspired. The Lunar Frontier also guest features and pairs veteran masters, such as Anthony Wonsey, David Kikoski, with the next generation of rising New York players.
He maintains jazz residencies around NYC at venues such as The Red Pavilion, Bar Next Door, Laissez Faire at The Beekman, as well as appearances at Le Poisson Rouge, Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater, 54 Below ("Broadway's living room"), the National Arts Club, Nublu. His dual identity as guitarist and violinist brings distinctive color to his arrangements, which BroadwayWorld describes as "tender, almost aching... made the room go quiet." Eternal Wind has collaborated with partners including Uniqlo and Studio Ghibli.
The Lunar Frontier: Cowboy Bebop & Jazz That Inspired It
Owen Chen's “Lunar Frontier” at The Red Pavilion features a hard-bop quintet connecting the music of Cowboy Bebop with the 1960s jazz it came from — Yoko Kanno's book alongside Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, and the standards tradition. The project features a rotation of veteran and rising NYC jazz artists, with a debut recording in development for 2027.
Eternal Wind
Owen Chen's “Eternal Wind” is a double-guitar contemporary jazz ensemble that reimagines popular film and video game music scores. Drawing from post-bop, and contemporary jazz and fusing influences from classical, world music, pop, and R&B, this cinematic jazz ensemble reshapes familiar melodies into immersive improvisational experiences.
Eternal Wind's debut album, The Ghibli Collection (Origin/OA2 Records, 2026), earned praise from international press while the ensemble's sold-out Brooklyn residency has run more than 60+ shows since 2024. The ensemble's programs have been presented at institutions such as Third Street Music School, National Arts Club, as well as galas, cultural events, and private performances in New York City.
The Ghibli Collection (Origin/OA2 Records) is distributed internationally through Origin’s partners in Europe and Japan · Radio one-sheet (PDF)
“Eternal Wind created a space where everyone got to reconnect with the stories and songs that shaped them.” - BroadwayWorld
Selected Press
“Albums of this caliber inevitably raise high expectations for what comes next. After a project as romantic and enigmatic as The Ghibli Collection, audiences will naturally expect more.”
“revealing Chen’s gift for storytelling through music. His work possesses a cinematic quality, painting landscapes and characters through melody and offering listeners not just music but immersive worlds. ”
“Owen Chen is, without a doubt, an artist who deserves to be discovered without delay.”
“Pat Metheny-esque landscape to them, lyrical yet gently dance, with strings crying and sighing”
“His guitar playing in particular is carefully crafted, expressive, and marked by great subtlety.”
“The originality of the musical arrangements in this project ensures that his future, through what we hope will be many personal creations to come, will be widely appreciated for both its poetic subtlety and technical mastery. ”
Session Work
Pop, musical theater, film, and EDM
Short Film
Acoustic guitarist
Albums
ETERNAL WIND [eternalwindmusic.com]
The Ghibli Collection (2026)
Released under Origin Records (OA2 Records), March 2026.
Guitarist Owen Chen introduces Eternal Wind, a dual-guitar-led ensemble that reimagines the timeless stories of the Japanese animation company Studio Ghibli through the expressive lens of modern jazz. Developed over a year of performances at Brooklyn's Red Pavilion and shaped by Chen's long-standing collaboration with guitarist Andrew Cheng, the album channels the emotional gravity, tenderness, and wonder of Joe Hisaishi's iconic film scores into a deeply personal improvisational language. Reviewers praised the performances for their dramatic weight and aching nostalgia, moments where the room seemed to hold its breath as familiar melodies resurfaced with renewed urgency and vulnerability. Anchored by the conversational interplay of two guitars and supported by a collective of rising New York jazz musicians, the arrangements move fluidly between lyricism and risk, honoring the source material while allowing space for spontaneity and discovery. For Chen, the project reflects an Asian American experience of reconciling formative influences into a voice that feels wholly his own; for listeners, it offers a chance to reconnect with beloved stories in ways that feel both unexpected and profoundly familiar. The Ghibli Collection marks a compelling debut and the emergence of Eternal Wind's distinctive sound.
https://originarts.com/oa2/recordings/recording.php?TitleID=22250
Eternal (2022)
Debut (EP) "Eternal" of 4 original compositions was released on April 24th 2022.
