Brian began his career in music at an early age, studying percussion, piano, and voice. After studying music theory and composition at Stephen F Austin State University and later The University of Texas at Austin, he moved to New York City to continue a creative partnership with friend and playwright, Matt Cox.

Brian would go on to compose the music to several Cox-penned plays, notably Puffs: Or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic (2015), and Witches?! In Salem (2024). Both Puffs and Witches?! are performed by theaters, big and small, all over the world. Other works for theater include the music for the ongoing Giant Skybeam projects at Second City Brooklyn, Kapow-i GoGo and its many iterations and holiday specials (2014-2023) at The PIT, and Magnificent Revengers (2018).

Brian has been a longtime collaborator with YouTuber Patrick Willems, and has composed theme songs, underscore, and song numbers for Willems’s YouTube channel over the years, which have garnered millions of views. In 2022 Brian composed his first feature length score for, Night of the Coconut (2022) directed by Willems, which had a soundtrack record released by Mondo Records. Brian’s other projects with Willems include music for The Patrick Willems Holiday Special (2023) on Nebula, and most recently the score for Willems’s upcoming short film, The Dinner Plan (2025).

In 2018 Brian was selected to journey to Gates of the Arctic National Park in Alaska with 7 other composers from all over the world as a part of the Composing in the Wilderness program. His piece for the Corvus ensemble Arctic Baptism–a piece chronicling his trip and accidentally falling in the Koyukuk River several times–premiered later that year at Federal Hall in New York City.

In addition to his work as a composer and lyricist, Metolius is an accomplished percussionist, pianist, and vocalist. Brian Metolius lives in Oregon with his wife and chihuahua.