Ryan was an aspiring physicist and accomplished pianist when he first heard the organ at age 15, and was fascinated by the prospect of playing all his favorite music on a new and fascinating instrument. Two years and a lot of practicing later, he applied to Juilliard and was accepted as an organ major. 

Since then, he's become an increasingly busy concert organist. Ryan has also become notorious for his programming—while his repertoire is, at its core, traditional, some very unusual selections find their way onto programs. A background in piano and opera accompaniment has manifested itself in the form of many transcriptions, not only of virtuosic piano repertoire like Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit and Liszt's Sonata in B Minor, but also of orchestral music like Strauss' Alpine Symphony, Ives' Fourth Symphony, and a number of opera overtures and excerpts. Ryan has also specialized in the "single piece concert," where a full-length program is taken up by a single titanic work or a themed collection, such as Bach's Clavier Übung III, Duruflé's complete works, Reger's Chorale Fantasias, and multiple cycles by Messiaen. Finally, a vocal advocate for the role of improvisation in classical music, he has been known to perform improvisations in the styles of multiple composers, especially those who wrote little for the organ: a hypothetical concert may close with an imaginary Brahms or Mahler symphony. He is not yet brave enough to perform his own compositions, but that may change in the near future...

Ryan's recordings have been broadcast this past year on NPR (Bach), WQXR (more Bach), and BBC3 (Milton Babbitt's rarely-played Manifold Music). Competition credits include the American Guild of Organists' Regional Competition (winner), the Longwood Gardens International Organ Competition (semi-finalist), and the AGO's NYACOP (currently a semi-finalist). He has recently attained a Master's degree from The Juilliard School, studying with Paul Jacobs, and is delighted to join the doctoral program at Yale School of Music this fall, where he will study with Tom Murray.