Musical America 64th annual “of the year” awards, announced today by publisher Stephanie Challener, celebrate conductor and soprano Barbara Hannigan as Artist of the Year, Jake Heggie as Composer of the Year, Víkingur Ólafsson as Instrumentalist of the Year, Angel Blue as Vocalist of the Year, and James Robinson as Director of the Year. They are being recognized, said Challener in comments, because “they have advanced the artform…far beyond any expectations and have brought entirely new perspectives and vistas to the performing arts.”
Known internationally for both of her artistries, the Canadian-born Hannigan on November 26 launches a ten-city recital tour of North America with pianist Bertrand Chamayou in Montreal. (She comes to New York in December.) As to life on the podium, in addition to guest conducting major international ensembles, she is to be the next music director of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and is the current principal guest conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, associate artist of the London Symphony Orchestra, Première Artiste Invitée with l’Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and, as of 2024-25, principal guest of the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne. She is know, in particular, for her explorations of new work.
Composer of the Year Jake Heggie is perhaps the most performed contemporary opera composer working today: To date, his 2000 opera Dead Man Walking has been mounted over 75 times on five continents; his 2010 Moby-Dick is scheduled for its Met Opera premiere in March 2025; Earth 2.0 premieres December 6, 2024, with the Fort Worth Symphony and the Urban Bush Women under conductor Robert Spano; Songs for Murdered Sisters gets its U.S. orchestral premiere next January by the Philadelphia Orchestra, first in Marian Anderson Hall, then in Carnegie Hall. Heggie began his opera career in the public relations office of the San Francisco Opera; clearly he has come a very long way.
Instrumentalist of the Year Víkingur Ólafsson who comes to Carnegie and Severance halls in February with Yuja Wang to repeat their London superduo recital, is known for having devoted an entire year to Bach’s Goldberg Variations, an exception to the wide variety of concerto repertoire he performs with orchestras around the world The Icelandic pianist has premiered some six concertos by his country’s own composers, well as solo and chamber works by Atli Ingólfsson, Mark Simpson, and Mark-Anthony Turnage. He numbers Philip Glass among his close collaborators and has a vast discography with DG, to which he is signed exclusively.
Vocalist of the Year Angel Blue has just completed a stunningly successful run singing the role of Margarita Xirgu in Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar at the Metropolitan Opera. The onetime beauty-pageant winner takes the title role in the Met’s new production of Aida at its gala opening on New Year’s eve, followed a month later by a return to her 2017 debut role at the house—Mimì in La Bohème. She has sung on international opera stages and in recital halls, and won two Grammy awards, one of them for her staring role in the Met Opera’s recording of Porgy and Bess. An outgoing and sparkling personality, Blue kept many classical music fans duly entertained (and uplifted) during the pandemic hosting her own weekly show on Zoom, Faithful Fridays.
Speaking of the Met Opera’s Porgy and Bess, it was Director of the Year James Robinson who staged that award-winning production anew in 2019-20, as well as many others both at the Met and around the world. Recently the Seattle Opera lured Robinson away from his 15-year tenure at Opera Theater of St. Louis (OTSL) to be its next general and artistic director. In 2012 Robinson convinced trumpeter and band leader Terence Blanchard that he could write an opera; that resulted in Champion and, shortly thereafter, Fire Shut Up in My Bones, both staged by Robinson first at OTSL and subsequently at the Met Opera, marking the latter company’s first-ever stagings of works by an African American composer. As with all of these Musical America 2025 Awardees, Robinson is, in act and in fact, a game changer for the performing arts.