about the composer

Roger Sessions (1896-1985) was an influential figure in the musical and cultural life of the United States. Along with his accomplishments as a composer, he was also a distinguished teacher and proponent of contemporary music. It is often said that his works reveal their beauty after several listenings. He has written:

"What we ask of music, first and last, is that it communicate experience -- experience of all kinds, vital and profound at its greatest, amusing or entertaining at another level. But communication is two-sided -- vital and profound communication makes demands also on those who are to receive it... demands in the sense of concentration, of genuine effort to receive what is being communicated." (Sessions)

Sessions' early works show the influence of Stravinsky and neo-classicism; after his stay in Europe (1925-1933), his music became increasingly chromatic, and by the 1950's he had gradually adopted the 12-tone method. Although he is considered primarily an orchestral composer, Sessions' opera Montezuma (1935-1963) and cantata When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd (1964-1970) are also highly regarded.

Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York to a family of old New England descent. He demonstrated prodigious musical talent early on, beginning piano lessons at five years and composing an opera by the age of 13. The remainder of his younger years was spent pursuing degrees at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut; at Yale he studied with Horatio Parker, Charles Ives' teacher two decades earlier. However, Sessions was most influenced by his studies with Ernest Bloch, whom he sought out in New York in 1919. Previously Sessions had taught at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts; from 1921 to 1925 he served as Bloch's assistant at the Cleveland Institute for Music in Ohio.

Sessions lived in Europe from 1925 to 1933; these years had a significant influence on his 'internationalist' attitude towards music and politics, as he observed first-hand the rise of far-reaching political movements. This would later put him in a position at odds with his close friend Aaron Copland (and many other composers of the time), who believed in creating a concert music that was recognizably American. Nonetheless, the two organized a series of Copland-Sessions Concerts in New York (1928-1931), which brought many works of the European avant-garde to US audiences for the first time.

After returning to the US, Sessions held a number of teaching positions, most notably at Princeton University in New Jersey (1936-1945, 1953-1965), the University of California at Berkeley (1945-1953, 1966-1967), and the Juilliard School in New York (1966-1983). In 1968-1969 he gave the prestigious Norton lectures at Harvard University. Sessions' success as a teacher is apparent from the many composers of varied styles and dispositions who were his students. They include: Milton Babbitt, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, David Diamond, Vivian Fine, John Harbison, Andrew Imbrie, Earl Kim, Leon Kirchner, Tod Machover, Donald Martino, Conlon Nancarrow, Frederic Rzewski, George Tsontakis, and Ellen Taaffe Zwilich.

From 1934 to 1942 Sessions served as president of the American section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM). He received numerous awards during his lifetime, including the Brandeis Creative Arts Award, Gold Medal of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, MacDowell Medal, two Pulitzer Prizes (a career award in 1974 and for his Concerto for Orchestra in 1982), and 14 honorary doctorates. He published a number of books and articles, including The Musical Experience of Composer, Performer, Listener (1950) and Reflections on the Music Life in the United States (1956). His music has been recorded on a number of major labels as well as Albany, CRI, Koch International, New World, Phoenix, and Vox.