Sebastian Currier

Sebastian Currier is the 2007 recipient of the prestigious Grawemeyer Award. Heralded as "music with a distinctive voice" by the New York Times and as "lyrical, colorful, firmly rooted in tradition, but absolutely new" by the Washington Post, his music has been performed at major venues worldwide by acclaimed artists and orchestras.

His music has been enthusiastically embraced by violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, for whom he wrote Aftersong, which she performed extensively in the US and Europe, including Carnegie Hall in New York, Symphony Hall in Boston, the Barbican in London, and the Grosses Festspielhaus in Salzburg. A critic from The Times (UK) said, "If all his pieces are as emotionally charged and ingenious in their use of rethought tonality as this, give me more." His violin concerto, Time Machines, dedicated to Ms. Mutter, was premiered by the New York Philharmonic in June 2011, and called “rapturously beautiful” by the New York Times. A work for chorus and orchestra, Sleepers and Dreamers, was premiered at the 2012 Grant Park Music Festival in honor of the 50th anniversary of the festival’s chorus. New works to be premiered during the 2012—13 season include Deep-Sky Objects, for soprano and ensemble; Fifteen Minutes, for flute, harp, and viola; and Quanta, for orchestra.

His chamber music was presented by the Berlin Philharmonic in 2007 and 2008, including three world premieres. In December 2009 he returned to Berlin again for the premiere of his harp concerto Traces, which was commissioned by the Berlin Philharmonic and performed by harpist Marie-Pierre Langlamet under the baton of Donald Runnicles.

His Microsymph, referred to by the composer as a large-scale symphony that has been squeezed into only ten minutes, was commissioned by the American Composers Orchestra and premiered at Carnegie Hall. It has also been performed by such orchestras as the San Francisco Symphony, the Gewandhaus Orchestra, Eos Orchestra, and the National Symphony Orchestra, and has been recorded by the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra with Hugh Wolff, conductor.

He has received many prestigious awards including the Berlin Prize, Rome Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and has held residencies at the MacDowell and Yaddo colonies. He received a DMA from the Juilliard School; and from 1999-2007 he taught at Columbia University.