Composer; Nominated for two
Academy Awards, first for "
Altered States" - film score (1980); the second time he won, for "
The Red Violin" (1999)
John Corigliano spent a long time
composing in obscurity, not fully embracing
the super-academic mindset of composing in the last half of the
20th century and instead preferring to work with
melody and
harmony as well as
tone rows and
aleotoric systems.
First became heavily recognized in the music industry for his
Sony recording of
Symphony #1, written for a friend he had lost to the
AIDS virus in the early nineties. Several
Grammy nominations and wins followed on the heels of this recording.
Joshua Bell, the young
virtuoso, was the featured
violinist on the soundtrack for
The Red Violin.Soon after winning the Oscar, Corigliano had a premiere at
Carnegie Hall where he and
Lea Salonga performed his resetting of
Bob Dylan lyrics to
piano and
solo alto voice.
I've had the pleasure of meeting John Corgliano and he doesn't have the same
snootyness most composers do. He's a very nice guy and
a brilliant composer, perhaps the modern version of
Beethoven. Seriously.