By Barry Lenson
We discover it reassuring that younger People are nonetheless deciding to turn into composers. It’s extra fantastic nonetheless that at the very least one in all these youthful People, Jennifer Higdon, is composing works which can be so well-crafted, stunning, and infrequently profound.
Ms. Higdon was born on December 31, 1962, in Brooklyn, New York. Thus far, she has received a Pulitzer Prize and three Grammys. On this composer profile, we’re excited to inform you extra about her.
About Jennifer Higdon
Ms. Higdon began to play the flute on the age of 15. Three years later, she turned a flute main at Bowling Inexperienced State College, the place she was inspired to discover composition. By age 21, she had established herself as a composer. She then went on to earn an Artist’s Diploma on the Curtis Institute, the place she studied with David Loeb and Ned Rorem.
A number of many years have handed, and he or she has turn into a significant determine in up to date classical music. She has written works for orchestra, wind ensemble, chamber ensembles, voice, and refrain. Her opera, Chilly Mountain, was premiered in 2015.
Her music has been hailed by Fanfare Journal as having “the excellence of being directly advanced, subtle however readily accessible emotionally”, with the Occasions of London citing it as “… rooted, but imbued with integrity and freshness.” The League of American Orchestras experiences that she is one in all America’s most continuously carried out composers.
And sure, she has received awards, together with the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Music for her Violin Concerto and three Grammy Awards for Greatest Modern Classical Composition for her Percussion Concerto (2010), Viola Concerto (2018), and Harp Concerto (2020).
To be taught extra, go to JenniferHigdon.com
Compositions by Jennifer Higdon You Can Hear on Classical Archives*
Orchestral Works and Concertos
- Viola Concerto (2015) – Winner of the 2018 Grammy Award for Greatest Modern Classical Composition.
- Percussion Concerto (2005) – Winner of the 2010 Grammy Award for Greatest Modern Classical Composition.
- Blue Cathedral for flute, clarinet and orchestra (1999) – A stunning orchestral piece that has turn into a favourite amongst American orchestras and their audiences.
- All Issues Majestic for orchestra (1911) – A 25-minute piece for orchestra that describes three out of doors settings (The Tetons, String Lake and the Snake River) and concludes with an aural depiction of cathedrals.
Chamber Works
Choral Works
- Magnum Mysterium (2002) – A seven-minute piece for small refrain.
- Love Got here Down (2022) – A heat and beautiful setting of a Christmas poem by Christine Rossetti. Some would possibly name this piece “4 minutes of sheer magnificence.” And we’d agree.
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