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michael hersch Michael Hersch (b. 1971) "has been involved with classical music just a decade, steers clear of current events; his intense and melancholy expression wells up from inside, from his own turbulent self, and rages at the whole world. In short, he composes music the only way he knows how; it's the rest of us who've moved towards him," wrote the Financial Times about his new Piano Concerto, premiered in St. Louis in November 2002. Before the age of 30, Hersch was awarded the Prix de Rome (2000) and the Berlin Prize (2001), as well as a Guggenheim Fellowship (1997), and he has had his music performed around the world. In December 1996, Hersch was a graduate student at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, contemplating what life as a composer would be like after graduation, when conductor Marin Alsop picked his score as the winner of the American Composers Prize and gave the work, Elegy for strings, a performance at Lincoln Center in February 1997. Since that time, Hersch has received commissions from Carnegie Hall, the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Dallas Symphony, the St. Louis Symphony, the Colorado Symphony, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the 92nd Street Y, the Orchestra of St. Luke's and many other organizations. His music has been performed in Europe, Russia, the Far East and the US. In the fall of 2001, while in Berlin, Hersch completed the score of his Second Symphony, which was commissioned by the Pittsburgh Symphony and Mariss Jansons. It received its world premiere in Pittsburgh in April 2002, followed by the New York premiere at Carnegie Hall the same month. The Wall Street Journal wrote about the Symphony No. 2,"it calls into being a world resonant with profound, sometimes rhapsodic, sometimes crushing emotion." For the 2002-2003 season Hersch was selected as the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's "Composer of the Year." The orchestra performed three of Hersch's orchestral works during the season, including the PSO premiere of his First Symphony on their opening night gala. Hersch composed a piano concerto for Garrick Ohlsson, commissioned by the Pittsburgh Symphony, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, and the Oregon Symphony. The world premiere took place in St. Louis in November 2002, with the West Coast premiere following in Oregon in January 2003 and a performance in Pittsburgh in March 2003. Recently, members of the Berlin Philharmonic played Hersch's newly revised Octet for Strings at the Philharmonie in Berlin, and Hersch's Ashes of Memory received four performances by the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. Highlights from last season included the New York premiere of Ashes of Memory in March 2001, performed by Mariss Jansons and the Pittsburgh Symphony at Carnegie Hall, and the world premiere of a commissioned work, Umbra, for the Brooklyn Philharmonic and Robert Spano in April 2001. The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center presented two new works last season: the New York premiere of his Solo Sonata for Violin, and a piano piece, Mistral, which Hersch performed at Merkin Concert Hall. His music was also featured in a program hosted by Ned Rorem at the 92nd Street Y. Hersch's alma mater, Peabody Conservatory, also performed Ashes of Memory at Lincoln Center in April 2001, and in May 2001, Merkin Concert Hall presented a chamber concert featuring his music. While in Rome during the summer of 2001, Hersch wrote a work for the composer Hans Werner Henze, Reflections on a Work of Henze, which Hersch performed for Mr. Henze on the occasion of his 75th birthday. A new work for clarinet and cello was also performed at the Pantheon in Rome in 2001 at the RomaEuropa Festival. Other past performance highlights include the Dallas Symphony Orchestra's commission and performance of Hersch's Symphony No. 1 with Alan Gilbert conducting in November 1999, and a repeat of the work at the Cabrillo Festival with conductor Marin Alsop in 2000. In October 1998 the New York Chamber Symphony performed the world premiere of Recollections of Fear, Hope and Discontent and the CBC Vancouver Symphony performed the premiere of On Sorrow, Anger and Reflection. In April 1999 Hersch's Piano Quartet received its premiere at Weill Recital Hall, commissioned by the Ellen Taaffe Zwilich Young Composers Workshop at Carnegie Hall. Hersch's chamber music has been performed at the Pantheon in Rome, Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center, Tanglewood Music Festival, the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan, the American Music Festival in Washington DC, Merkin Concert Hall in New York, and elsewhere around the world. One of the youngest composers ever to win the Guggenheim Fellowship in Music (1997), Hersch has also received awards from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, the American Composers Award, the New York Youth Symphony's "First Music" prize, two "Meet the Composer" grants, three ASCAP Young Composer Awards and five ASCAP Foundation grants. He was also the youngest composer included in the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center's "Great Day in New York," photograph and series of programs in January 2000. In 1997 he was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center. In June 1998, he attended the Norfolk Festival in Connecticut and the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. Hersch was born in Washington, DC and grew up in Reston, Virginia. He studied composition at the Moscow Conservatory in Russia and received a Certificate in Composition in 1995. In 1997 he completed his Masters Degree in Composition at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore. Hersch's music is published by 21C Music Publishing, Inc.
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