Bio

Mantvydas Leonas Pranulis (b. 1996) is a Lithuanian composer, performer (trumpet, piano) and vocalist, known for a diverse, boundary-pushing musical style that blends jazz, classical, minimalism, electronic and experimental genres. He began his musical education at the Vilnius Karoliniškės Music School, later studied jazz trumpet and keyboards at the Juozas Tallat-Kelpša Conservatory, and entered the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in 2014. In 2018 he shifted his focus to composition under the mentorship of Jonas Jurkūnas and Latvian composer Mārtiņš Viļums.

His work is respected for its emotional honesty, introspective nature and immersive qualities, often exploring abstract, spiritual and cosmic themes.

Since 2013 he has led, co-founded and performed with several ensembles: Brave Noises, which released three albums and toured across Europe (Germany, the UK, Latvia, Estonia and Poland); the experimental performative jazz trio luvhurts, noticed in Lithuania for provocative and brave performances; and Allergy+. As a performer he has given more than 200 concerts.

His 2020 solo album Liar Who Fell in Love With Truth showcased his experimental side — IDM, glitch, noise and techno blended with vocal elements, featuring collaborations with Monikaze, Augustė-Ona, El chico fuendre and Andrius Šiurys. In 2025 he released the EP Floating, an experiment merging pop clichés with his signature avant-garde approach.

He has composed music for more than 30 stage productions — notably The Island That Isn’t, Jona, The Reunification of the Two Koreas, Sonny’s Blues and Marius Repšys On Stage — as well as for film and experimental choral-electronic pieces such as Not Allowed, Finem and Paths. For his theatre music he has been awarded and nominated multiple times at Lithuania’s Golden Stage Cross awards. In 2021, with luvhurts, he won the Vilnius Jazz Young Power competition together with the Best Original Composition award.

One of his most ambitious works is S’Anatomia, a “cosmological opera” performed at Kaunas Chamber Theatre since 2021 in collaboration with Kosmos Theatre, inspired by planetary frequencies and human inner states. For this work he received the M. K. Čiurlionis Young Composer Grant.

Beyond composing and performing, Pranulis is actively involved in education and social creativity. He is the founder of Kitur (VšĮ Kitur), a non-profit institution through which he develops interdisciplinary cultural projects, sound works and creative technology. Together with his sister he co-founded the children’s music school Muzikalkė, organizing camps and creative programs. Since childhood he has volunteered with people with disabilities, and he contributes to inclusive, interdisciplinary projects such as Mirror and Bioforms — using music as a space for dialogue, empathy and inner discovery.