Michael Daugherty is one of the most frequently commissioned, programmed, and recorded composers on the American concert music scene today. He has been hailed by The Times (London) as “a master icon maker” with a “maverick imagination, fearless structural sense and meticulous ear.” Daugherty came to international attention when his Metropolis Symphony (1988–93), a tribute to the Superman comics, was performed in 1995 at Carnegie Hall by
conductor David Zinman and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and subsequently recorded for Argo/Decca. This work is available on Naxos American Classics 8.559635.
Born in 1954 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Daugherty is the son of a dance-band drummer and the oldest of five brothers, all professional musicians. He studied music composition at the University of North Texas (1972–76), the Manhattan School of Music (1976–78) and computer music at Boulez’s IRCAM in Paris (1979–80). Daugherty received his doctorate from Yale University in 1986 where his teachers included Jacob Druckman, Earle Brown, Roger Reynolds, and Bernard Rands. During this time, he also collaborated with jazz arranger Gil Evans in New York, and pursued further studies with composer György Ligeti in Hamburg, Germany (1982–84). After teaching music composition from 1986–1990 at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Daugherty joined the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance in Ann Arbor, Michigan where, since 1991, he has been a mentor to many of today’s most talented young composers.
Daugherty is a frequent guest of professional orchestras, festivals, universities and conservatories around the world where he participates in pre-concert talks, teaches composition master classes and works with student composers and ensembles. Daugherty has been the Composer-in-Residence with the Louisville Symphony Orchestra (2000), Detroit Symphony Orchestra (1999–2003), Colorado Symphony Orchestra (2001–2002), Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music (2001–04, 2006–08), West Shore Symphony Orchestra (2005–06), Eugene Symphony (2006), Henry Mancini Summer Institute (2006), Music from Angel Fire Chamber Music Festival (2006) and Pacific Symphony (2010).
American orchestras who have performed Daugherty’s music include, among others, the American Composers Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, Nashville Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony, New York Philharmonic, Pacific Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, St Louis Symphony Orchestra, St Paul Chamber Orchestra and Syracuse Symphony. Orchestral performances abroad of Daugherty’s music have been given by, among others, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Bochumer Symphoniker, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Vienna Radio Orchestra, Phiharmonia (London), RAI Orchestra of Turin and the Tonalle Orchester Zürich.
Daugherty has received numerous awards, distinctions, and fellowships for his music including a Fulbright Fellowship (1977), Kennedy Center Friedheim Award (1989), Goddard Lieberson Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1991), fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts (1992) and the Guggenheim Foundation (1996), the Stoeger Prize from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (2000) and the Michigan Governor’s Award (2004). In 2005, Daugherty received the Lancaster Symphony Orchestra Composer’s Award, and in 2007, the Delaware Symphony Orchestra selected Daugherty as the winner of the A.I. duPont Award. Also in 2007, Daugherty was named “Outstanding Classical Composer” at the Detroit Music Awards and received the American Bandmasters Association Ostwald Award for his composition Raise the Roof for Timpani and Symphonic Band. His music is published by Peermusic Classical and since 2003 by Boosey and Hawkes.
Daugherty’s large orchestral works include UFO (1999), a percussion concerto commissioned and premiered by Evelyn Glennie and the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leonard Slatkin, recorded on Naxos American Classics 8.559165, and Fire and Blood (2003), a violin concerto commissioned and premiered by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra conducted by conductor Neeme Järvi, recorded on Naxos American Classics 8.559372. The Detroit Symphony also commissioned and premiered Daugherty’s second symphony, MotorCity Triptych (2000), also recorded on Naxos American Classics 8.559372. His third symphony, Philadelphia Stories (2001), was commissioned and premiered by the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by David Zinman.
