Julia Ryu is a Korean-American composer, lyricist, playwright, arranger, and actor, born in St. Louis, Missouri, and currently based in both St. Louis and New York City. She creates works across a wide range of genres, including contemporary musical theater, Disney-style musicals, pop, and comedy. Her works have been performed at prestigious venues including the American Repertory Theater at Harvard University, Farkas Hall, the Agassiz Theater, AMAS Musical Theatre, the School of Theatre at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, The Nora Theatre Company at Central Square Theater, Harvard ArtLab, the University of Missouri, and the Community Music School at Webster University.

Julia has showcased her talent through a variety of productions. She collaborated with actor J. Quinton Johnson to create an original musical adaptation of Alice in Wonderland, which was workshopped at AMAS Musical Theatre in New York and premiered at The Coterie Theatre in Kansas City. She also developed family musicals such as Jack and the Beanstalk: A Musical Adventure and Thumbelina: A Little Musical, which were performed at the American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) and The Nora Theatre Company. 

Having been a lifelong fan of Disney animation, Julia also created Shimcheong: A Folktale, a musical based on the traditional Korean story of Shimcheong. The show’s main theme song, “Dive,” went viral on TikTok, surpassing one million views, and her follower count grew by over ten thousand in a single day. The song was later featured in an animated commercial produced in collaboration with LG Electronics, bringing even more attention to her work. In recognition of these accomplishments, she was selected for the 4th annual "Women to Watch on Broadway" and became the youngest-ever recipient of the 18th Annual Fred Ebb Award.

During her time at Harvard University, Julia co-founded the Harvard College Asian Student Arts Project (ASAP), an organization dedicated to providing resources and community for Asian student artists. Her academic accomplishments are equally impressive: she received the 2020 Radcliffe Doris Cohen Levi Musical Theater Prize, was named a John Harvard Scholar, and was a finalist for the 2022 Louis Sudler Prize for the Arts in Music Composition. Currently, Julia is developing a new musical project in collaboration with the global live content company Library Company. Her upcoming work is set to premiere as a large-scale musical production in Korea in the first half of 2025, with plans to make its way to Broadway afterward.