Matt Smith is a composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist based in Los Angeles, California. His compositions synthesize lush harmonies and lilting lyricism with imaginative soundscapes, and draw inspiration from a deep love of stories, philosophy, and nature.

Matt’s music has found a home on esteemed stages and at prominent festivals worldwide, including the Aspen Summer Music Festival, the Atlantic Music Festival, the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Italy, the Mizzou International Composers Festival, Severance Hall in Cleveland, Ohio, and Dance Camera West at the Music Center of Los Angeles. His compositions have been performed by acclaimed ensembles including Alarm Will Sound, Brightwork Newmusic, the Canton Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra, the Diotima String Quartet, the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini, and Orchestra Senzaspine. He has also collaborated with notable artists including harpist Alexander Boldachev, sopranos Julia Johnson and Leela Subramaniam, violinist Elizabeth Phelps, and GRAMMY-winning soprano Hilá Plitmann.

A versatile, Matt is also a pianist, trombonist, singer, and producer. In 2014, he founded the electro-chamber quartet Iridas, which programmed original compositions inspired by jazz fusion and electronic dance music alongside standard jazz and classical repertoire. Their performances throughout the greater Los Angeles area ultimately garnered support for a successful tour of China in 2019. Matt currently performs with several Los Angeles–based ensembles and artists, including The Natural Supernatural and Hiram Rodriguez; he serves as Tenor Section Leader at the Parish of St. Matthew in the Palisades, is a member of the UCLA Chamber Singers, and is a keyboardist with Reality Los Angeles.

Matt earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Margaret Brouwer, Keith Fitch, and Steven Mark Kohn. He is a two-time recipient of CIM’s Donald Erb Prize in composition and has also been honored by the ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards. Currently, Matt is pursuing a PhD at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, where he studies with Richard Danielpour and Ian Krouse.