Composer-in-Residence, Eric Nathan

Eric Nathan’s (b. 1983) music has been called “as diverse as it is arresting” with a “constant vein of ingenuity and expressive depth” (San Francisco Chronicle), “thoughtful and inventive” (The New Yorker), and as “a marvel of musical logic” (Boston Classical Review).

Nathan, a 2013 Rome Prize Fellow and 2014 Guggenheim Fellow, has garnered acclaim internationally through performances by Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Scharoun Ensemble Berlin, International Contemporary Ensemble, Boston Symphony Chamber Players, JACK Quartet, American Brass Quintet, and A Far Cry, and by performers including Dawn Upshaw, Lucy Shelton, Tony Arnold, William Sharp, Jennifer Koh, Stefan Jackiw, Joseph Alessi, Gloria Cheng, and Gilbert Kalish. His music has been featured at the New York Philharmonic’s 2014 and 2016 Biennials, Carnegie Hall, Aldeburgh Music Festival, Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music, Aspen Music Festival, Ravinia Festival Steans Institute, 2012 and 2013 World Music Days, Library of Congress, and Louvre Museum.

Recent projects include commissions from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, including Why Old Places Matter (2014) for the Boston Symphony Chamber Players; the space of a door, that Andris Nelsons and the BSO premiered in 2016 and commercially released on the Naxos label in 2019; and Concerto for Orchestra, which Nelsons premiered on the 2019-20 season-opening concerts. Opening(2021), co-commissioned by the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation at the Library of Congress, was premiered by the MSO and broadcast nationally on a PBS television special.

Nathan has received commissions from the New York Philharmonic, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Barlow Endowment, Fromm Music Foundation, Tanglewood Music Center, and Aspen Music Festival. He’s been honored with a Goddard Lieberson Fellowship and Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Copland House residency, Civitella Ranieri Music Fellowship, ASCAP’s Rudolf Nissim Prize, four ASCAP Morton Gould Awards, BMI’s William Schuman Prize, Aspen Music Festival’s Jacob Druckman Prize, Leonard Bernstein Fellowship from the Tanglewood Music Center, and an Early Career Research Achievement Award from Brown University. Nathan has completed residencies at Yellow Barn, Copland House, and the American Academy in Rome, and is a 2022 Civitella Ranieri Foundation fellow.

Albany Records released a debut CD of Nathan’s solo and chamber music, Multitude, Solitude: Eric Nathan (2015), produced by Grammy-winner Judith Sherman. Chelsea Music Festival Records released Eric Nathan: Dancing with J.S. Bach (2019), featuring conductor Ken-David Masur in Nathan’s two suites of orchestrations of Bach keyboard works. In 2020, Gil Rose and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project released a portrait album of Nathan’s music on the BMOP Sound label, and New Focus Recordings released a two-CD set of Missing Words in 2022 and the album Some Favored Nook in 2023.

Nathan serves as Artistic Director of Collage New Music, a Boston’s oldest contemporary music ensemble, now in its 52nd season. He holds the position of Associate Professor of Music in composition and theory at Brown University's Department of Music. In 2018, he was awarded Brown’s most prestigious award for junior faculty, the Henry Merritt Wriston Fellowship, that recognizes excellence in teaching. He is currently Composer-in-Residence with the New England Philharmonic, and received his doctorate from Cornell. He holds degrees from Yale (B.A.) and Indiana University (M.M.).

Visit Eric Nathan’s Website

Previous Composers-in-Residence

2011-19 David Rakowski

2005-11 Peter Child

2002-05 Andy Vores

2000-02 Richard Cornell

1997-00 Michael Gandolfi

1994-97 Marjorie Merryman

1989-94 Richard Cornell

1985-89 Robert Kyr