Lewis Spratlan Photo by Frank Ward, courtesy of Amherst College

Pulitzer Surprise: Lewis Spratlan Wins for Second Act of 1978 Opera

Lewis Spratlan has received the 2000 Pulitzer Prize in music for "Life is a Dream, Opera in Three Acts: Act II, Concert Version." The piece was premiered on January 28, 2000 by Dinosaur Annex in Amherst MA. Originally written in 1975-78 on a commission from the New Haven Opera Theatre, the work was never performed by that company because it folded while Spratlan was "in the middle of writing the last act."

The opera is based on the 17th-century Spanish play "La Vida Es Sueño" by Pedro Calderón. Using an English libretto by James Maraniss, Mr. Spratlan creates a theatrical world in which the characters are given distinct musical thumbprints that are meant to embody their personalities. Dissonances and angularities of contemporary styles are linked with traditional dance, march and madrigal forms.

Richard Dyer of The Boston Globe wrote of the piece, "... musical languages are used for the purpose of characterization...The vocal writing defines the characters in basic and subtle ways; it also keeps the text clear; the orchestration is vivid, colorful, imaginative, and characteristic in the sense that it too defines the characters...The music is full of effects that sound genuinely theatrical -- a military band approaches, for example, and there is some lively stage music (peasant dancing, a choral madrigal, etc.)".

A native of Miami, Spratlan is a widely performed and much honored composer. A student of Mel Powell and Gunther Schuller at Yale, he has taught and conducted at Tanglewood, The Yale Summer School of Music and Art, and Amherst College, where he has been on the faculty since 1970. His music has been performed in New York, Los Angeles, Washington, Pittsburgh, Miami, London, Moscow, Montreal, Toronto, and perhaps most significantly, Boston, where he has received commissions and premieres from the Boston Musica Viva, The Dinosaur Annex Music Ensemble, soprano Karol Bennett, and pianist John McDonald, among others. Other New England-based ensembles, including the Springfield Symphony Orchestra, the Lydian String Quartet, the Windsor Quartet, and Ancora have performed his works as well.

He is the recipient of Guggenheim, NEA, Massachusetts Artists Foundation, and MacDowell Fellowships. Life is a Dream also won a top prize in the Rockefeller Foundation-New England Conservatory Opera Competition and Apollo and Daphne Variations won the New England Composers Orchestra Competition for readings of new works.

In October, 1989, Mr. Spratlan toured widely in Russia and Armenia as a guest of the Soviet Composers' Union. Toccapsody, for solo piano, and Apollo and Daphne Variations were premiered on this tour and Penelope's Knees was presented in Moscow's Rachmaninoff Hall under Emin Khatchatourian. Recent projects include the world premiere of In Memoriam, for five soloists, double chorus, and orchestra, a work which honors the victims of conquest, focusing on the Mayans and their lineage; the December, 1993, release of a CD of Night Music, for violin, clarinet, and percussion on the Gasparo label; the American premiere and two additional performances of Apollo and Daphne Variations by the Florida Orchestra under Jahja Lin in May, 1994; a commission from the Mohawk Trail Concerts for a setting of Richard Wilbur's A Barred Owl, for baritone, flute, bass clarinet, violin, cello and piano, premiered in July, 1994; the premiere of Concertino for violin and chamber ensemble in April, 1994; and the premiere on April 6, 1996, of Psalm 42, commissioned by the soprano Judith Jones-Gale. In August 1997, Mr. Spratlan was awarded a $15,000 commission by the Koussevitzky Music Foundation in the Library of Congress for the composition of a new work to be premiered by the Dinosaur Annex Music Ensemble in Boston. Vocalise with Duck for soprano and chamber ensemble was commissioned by the New York Ensemble Sequitur and was premiered at The Knitting Factory in New York on January 10 and 12, 1999. On January 28 (Amherst) and 30 (Boston), 2000, Dinosaur Annex Music Ensemble presented two world premieres, Sojourner for ten instruments.

Also nominated as finalists in the music category were: "Serenata Concertante" by Donald Martino, premiered on April 19, 1999 at Merkin Concert Hall, New York City, and "contes de feés" by John Zorn, premiered on February 17, 2000 at the Society for Ethical Culture, New York City.

The Pulitzer Prize winners were announced on April 10, 2000. The music category is for a distinguished musical composition of significant dimension by an American that has had its first performance in the United States during the year. The recipient receives five thousand dollars ($5,000).

[The June 2000 issue of NewMusicBox will feature an in-depth interview with Lewis Spratlan which will include QuickTime video excerpts and extensive RealAudio sound clips of his music.]