Jennifer Higdon has often been called a Renaissance woman of music; not only has she become a recognized and sought-after young composer (who is able to make her living on commissions), but she also frequently concertises on the flute and is active as a conductor. Donald Rosenberg of The Cleveland Plain Dealer, wrote that Ms. Higdon “is a composer with a powerful command of creative resources.” The Bellingham Herald stated that she “has an authentic creative voice of her own.” And The Philadelphia Inquirer's Lesley Valdez wrote “there’s no denying Higdon’s compositional ease or abundance of ideas. Her music has something to say and often does so with eloquence.” USA Today, in its December 30, 1996 edition of Classical Picks of the Year, named Jennifer Higdon the composer of the “Best New Piece of 1996.”
Ms. Higdon’s works have been performed extensively around the country, with performances at The White House, Weill Recital Hall, Merkin Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and Carnegie Hall by such performers as flutists Carol Wincenc and Jeffrey Khaner, pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin, Cassatt String Quartet, Lark Quartet, Da Vinci String Quartet, Miami String Quartet, Pacifica String Quartet, Prism Sax Quartet, Earplay, Dale Warland Singers, Philadelphia Singers, Oregon Symphony, Louisville Orchestra, New England Philharmonic, Nashville Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, Knoxville Symphony, and Atlanta Symphony. In 2002, her Concerto for Orchestra, commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra through grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Philadelphia Music Project (funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and administered by Settlement Music School), will receive its world premiere at the American Symphony Orchestra League’s 57th Annual National Conference.
In 1999, she was named a Pew Fellow in the Arts and composer-in-residence with the Continental Harmony Project by the American Composers Forum and the National Endowment for the Arts. Other distinctions include awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Academy of Arts & Letters (two awards), the International League of Women Composers, Composers Inc. (the Lee Ettelson Prize), the University of Delaware New Music Competition, the Louisville Orchestra, the Cincinnati Symphony’s Young Composer’s Competition, NACUSA, and ASCAP. In addition, she has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet-the-Composer, the American Composers Forum, and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. She has served as composer-in-residence at Tanglewood and Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival, and with the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, the Walden School, the Prism Saxophone Quartet, and the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco.
Ms. Higdon, a native of Brooklyn, New York, holds a Ph.D. and an M.A. degree, both in composition, from the University of Pennsylvania, a B.M. in flute performance from Bowling Green State University, and an Artist Diploma from The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
Ms. Higdon is on the composition faculty of The Curtis Institute of Music. She formerly served as conductor of the University of Pennsylvania Orchestra and Wind Ensemble and has served as Visiting Assistant Professor at Bard College. She is published exclusively by Lawdon Press.
