Steve Heitzeg

Steve Heitzeg (born October 15, 1959) is an American composer, whose works include compositions for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensemble, ballet, and film. His works often feature naturally-found instruments, such as stones, birch bark wind chimes, and sea glass shards to create music in celebration of the natural world.

Heitzeg was born and raised on a dairy farm in southern Minnesota by Louie and Barbara Heitzeg of Kiester. Heitzeg graduated from Gustavus Adolphus College in 1982 and received his PhD in music theory/composition from the University of Minnesota in 1986, studying with Dominick Argento.

Heitzeg first attracted attention for his score, A Marriage: Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz (starring Jane Alexander), in 1991 and for the award-winning children’s video, On the Day You Were Born, released by the Minnesota Orchestra in 1996. Heitzeg’s debut recording, Earthworks: music in honor of nature, was released two years later in April 1998.

Named Composer of the Year at the 2000 Minnesota Music Awards, Heitzeg has amassed a large body of compositions that address social and environmental issues with vision and compassion in such works as Aqua (Hommage à Jacques-Yves Cousteau), Blessed Are the Peacemakers, Blue Liberty, Elegy on Water, Endangered, Nobel Symphony, Symphony to the Prairie Farm, Voice of the Everglades (Epitaph for Marjory Stoneman Douglas) and Wounded Fields. In 2000 he also received a regional Emmy for his original score for the public TV documentary Death of the Dream: Farmhouses in the Heartland.

Heitzeg was awarded a McKnight Fellowship in 2001 and has received grants from the American Composers Forum, Meet the Composer, and the Jerome Foundation. In addition to concert and film music, Heitzeg composes ecoscores (intimate works with inventive musical syntax) that seek to honor nature and promote peace. Two of these works, Peace March for Paul and Sheila Wellstone and American Symphony (Unfinished), are in the permanent collection of Minneapolis’ Weisman Art Museum.

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