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Donald Macleod concludes his conversation with the Pulitzer and three-time Grammy Award-winning American composer Jennifer Higdon. Today they’re discussing how she’s refreshed the concerto form.

If you were to ask Jennifer Higdon what her biggest musical influence might be, she’s more likely to cite Lennon and McCartney than Bach or Beethoven. Born in 1962 in New York, the soundtrack of her childhood was the Beatles, Simon & Garfunkel and Peter Paul and Mary, the Rolling Stones, and reggae. A move to Atlanta, Georgia, and then to a farmhouse in rural Tennessee, added bluegrass and country music. It wasn’t until Higdon was in her teens that her musical curiosity directed her towards classical music. Formal studies followed, and she began to compose when she was 21 years old. Coming to classical music later on, has been, according to Higdon, a significant factor in her own musical language. She’s now one of the most performed living American composers. Having just completed her second opera and a concerto in the past year, Higdon is much in demand, with commissions on her books that take her right up to 2024.

Recorded at the end of May, speaking to Donald Macleod from Articulate Studios in Philadelphia, USA, in an extended interview Jennifer Higdon gives a fascinating insight into her life and her musical preoccupations. Starting with strings on Monday, they move on to vocal writing, the influence of colour on music, the natural world and writing concertos, an area which has now become something of a speciality.

As performers queue up to ask Jennifer Higdon to write them a Concerto, and garnering a Pulitzer for her Violin Concerto, Higdon talks about her ideas and her approach to a genre that dates back to the 16th century.

Violin Concerto
III: Fly Forward
Hilary Hahn, violin
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic
Vasily Petrenko, conductor

Concerto 4-3 for String trio and Orchestra
I: The Shallows
Forth Worth Symphony
Miguel Harth-Bedoya, conductor

Percussion Concerto (excerpt)
Colin Currie, percussion
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Marin Alsop, conductor

Zaka (excerpt)
Eighth Blackbird
Matt Albert, violin
Lisa Kaplan, piano
Nicholas Photinos, cello
Molly Alicia Barth, flutes
Michael J. Maccaferri, clarinets
Matthew Duvall, percussion

Concerto for Orchestra
Third movement
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra
Robert Spano, conductor

Harp Concerto
III: Lullaby
Yolanda Kondonassis, harp
The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra
Ward Stare, conductor

Producer: Johannah Smith