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Aaron Jay Kernis
Aaron Jay Kernis, one of the youngest composers ever to be awarded the Pulitzer Prize, (b. January 15, 1960, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), has become among the most esteemed musical figures of his generation. Each work of Kernis' bears the unmistakable stamp of a wildly fertile musical imagination and a distinctive voice forged out of the wide-ranging musical languages of the 1980s and 1990s. His music bursts with rich poetic imagery, brilliant instrumental color, distinctive musical wit, and infectious exuberance. His work is as likely to be inspired by the horrors of the Persian Gulf War (as in the much-talked about Symphony No. 2) as the love poems of Anna Swir (Love Scenes); the earthy rhythms of Salsa (100 Greatest Dance Hits) as the antics of a child (Before Sleep and Dreams); the surrealism of Gertrude Stein (Fragments of Gertrude Stein) as the complexities and high-craftsmanship of Italian mosaics (Invisible Mosaic III).
Kernis' music figures prominently on orchestral, chamber, and recital programs around the world. He has already written works for many of America's foremost musical institutions, including New Era Dance, commissioned for the 150th Anniversary of the New York Philharmonic and recorded by the Baltimore Symphony; Still Movement with Hymn, a piano quartet commissioned by American Public Radio for Christopher O'Riley, Pamela Frank, Paul Neubauer, and Carter Brey; Colored Field, a concerto for Julie Ann Giacobassi (English horn) and the San Francisco Symphony; Goblin Market for narrator and ensemble, on a text by Christina Rossetti, for the Birmingham [England] New Music Group; Air for violinist Joshua Bell; an a cappella work for the Birmingham Bach Choir and the Plymouth Music Series; Lament and Prayer, a work for violin and string orchestra for Pamela Frank and the Minnesota Orchestra; and Double Concerto for Violin, Guitar, and Orchestra, commissioned by the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Aspen Music Festival, and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra for Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and Sharon Isbin. Kernis helped to usher in the new Millennium with a monumental choral symphony, Garden of Light, commissioned by the Disney Company. A new version of Colored Field for cello and orchestra featuring Truls Mørk and a song cycle, Valentines, for Renée Fleming were both premiered by the Minnesota Orchestra in April 2000.
Kernis began his musical studies on the violin; at age 12 he began teaching himself piano, and, in the following year, composition. He continued his studies at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, the Manhattan School of Music, and the Yale School of Music, working with composers as diverse as John Adams, Charles Wuorinen, and Jacob Druckman. Kernis received national acclaim for his first orchestral work, dream of the morning sky, premiered by the New York Philharmonic at the 1983 Horizons Festival.
Kernis is one of the most honored young American composers. In addition to the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for his String Quartet No. 2 (musica instrumentalis), his many awards have included the 2002 Grawemeyer Award in Music Composition for the cello and orchestra version of Colored Field, the Stoeger Prize from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Rome Prize, an NEA grant, a Bearns Prize, a New York Foundation for the Arts Award, and three BMI Student Composer Awards. Currently he serves as the Minnesota Orchestra's New Music Advisor. Kernis' music is published by Associated Music Publishers.
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