Photo by J.D. Scott Dr. Jennifer Higdon

Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Dr. Jennifer Higdon is returning for her second residency in 2024-25 with the School of Music at the State University of New York at Fredonia.

As the third Claudette Sorel Visiting Artist at SUNY Fredonia, Dr. Higdon will attend several open rehearsals as well as public concerts by Fredonia ensembles that will feature her musical works during the residency from March 5 to March 8. She will also join a composition master class.

The residency and its many events, as well as successful residencies by renowned composers Chen Yi (2022-2023) and Valerie Coleman (2023-2024) that preceded it, are made possible thanks to a gift from The Sorel Organization, Inc., through the Fredonia College Foundation.

Higdon’s itinerary includes attending a performance by the Fredonia Wind Ensemble, under the direction of Senior Lecturer Donna Dolson, that features her work, “Machine,” at the Harry A. King Concert Hall on Wednesday, March 5, at 8 p.m.

Higdon will also be in the audience when the Fredonia Concert Band, under the direction of Adjunct Lecturer Carrie Pawelski, performs Higdon’s “Road Stories,” also in King, on Thursday, March 6, at 8 p.m.

Fredonia’s student performers will be showcased in a chamber setting with a recital of chamber music composed by Higdon in the Juliet J. Rosch Recital Hall on Friday, March 7, at 8 p.m.

Higdon will also work with student performers in a series of open chamber workshops held in Rosch Recital Hall on Thursday, March 6, from 1:30 to 5:30 p.m., and Friday, March 7, from 10 a.m. to noon and 3 to 5 p.m.

Three residency events open to the public will be held on Saturday, March 8.

Higdon will work with School of Music composition students in Mason Hall Room 1080 at 9:30 a.m. The Student Opera Theatre Association will present scenes from Higdon’s GRAMMY-nominated opera “Cold Mountain” at 2 p.m. as part of its Opera Scenes production at the 1891 Fredonia Opera House Performing Arts Center. (Tickets for Opera Scenes are $5 for students, $8 for seniors and $10 for adults.)

The residency’s concluding event, a Fredonia College Symphony concert that includes Higdon’s orchestral work “Blue Cathedral” – one of the most often performed works by a living composer in the last 25 years – will be held in King Concert Hall on Saturday, March 8, at 8 p.m. “Blue Cathedral” has been performed more than 1,000 times.

Compositions by Higdon, who makes her living exclusively through commissions and publishing, represent a range of genres, from chamber to orchestral to wind ensemble, as well as vocal, choral and opera.

A Brooklyn, N.Y., native, Higdon has received commissions from The Philadelphia Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, as well groups that include the Tokyo String Quartet, Lark Quartet, Eighth Blackbird and the President’s Own United States Marine Band.

She has also written works for renowned artists such as baritone Thomas Hampson and mezzo Sasha Cooke; pianists Yuja Wang and Gary Graffman; and violinists Joshua Bell, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and Hilary Hahn.

Her first opera, “Cold Mountain,” was commissioned by Santa Fe Opera, Opera Philadelphia, North Carolina Opera and Minnesota Opera and was awarded the prestigious International Opera Award for Best World Premiere in 2016.

Upcoming premieres for the 2024-2025 season include a new opera for Pittsburgh Opera, a chamber work for the Icarus Quartet and an orchestral work for the Chicago Youth Symphony.

Higdon received the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in Music for her Violin Concerto and is also a three-time GRAMMY-winner.

Her music has been hailed by Fanfare Magazine as having “the distinction of being at once complex, sophisticated but readily accessible emotionally.” The Times of London cited it as “… traditionally rooted yet imbued with integrity and freshness.” Higdon has recorded more than 90 CDs.

Higdon was recently inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Philosophical Society, founded by Benjamin Franklin.

More information about Higdon is available at http://www.jenniferhigdon.com/