Yekaterina Merkulyeva was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia. She graduated with honors from the piano department of the Rimsky Korsakov College of Music under Galina Orlovskaia.  She studied composition with Yuri Falik in the Saint Petersburg conservatory. Upon receiving her Master’s degree in 1983, Ms. Merkulyeva’s Carnival Overture for Symphony Orchestra was performed at the 19 Leningrad Spring Music Festival.  Her various compositions include piano, chamber, orchestral, vocal and choral music.  Her compositions of modern and ensemble folk music have been performed in Russia, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Georgia, Belarus, and Czechoslovakia.  Ms. Merkulyeva taught composition in the Saint Petersburg Music School, and numerous music festivals and concerts have featured her students’ compositions.  Additionally, she has taught piano, music theory, keyboard harmony and composition at the Bronx Music School/Mercy College.  Upon her arrival to New York in 1990 she performed her pieces on the program “The Vera Allik Show” (on WEBR-CA, Channel 17).  Her compositions were performed in the Nicholas Roerich Museum concert hall and at Lincoln Center’s Bruno Walter Auditorium in the concert “Bridge,” featuring new and contemporary music by American and European composers.  Music critics have written: “Ancient folk roots, cry, lamentations and speech traditions are widely used in the music Yekaterina Merkulyeva’s pieces. They are amazingly melodic and singing” and “Music of Ms. Merkulyeva combine traditions of folk Russian music and music of the 20th century.” In 1999 Ms. Merkulyeva became a member of the Piano Teachers Congress of New York and a composer member of the New York Composers Circle in 2006.