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.

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