Kevin Matthew Puts (born January 3, 1972) is an American composer, best known for his opera The Hours and for winning a Pulitzer Prize in 2012 for his first opera Silent Night and a Grammy Award in 2023 for his concerto Contact.

Early life and education

Puts was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and grew up in Alma, Michigan. He studied composition and piano at the Eastman School of Music and Yale University, earning the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Eastman School of Music. Among his teachers were Samuel Adler, Jacob Druckman, David Lang, Christopher Rouse, Joseph Schwantner, Martin Bresnick, and, in piano, Nelita True. He also studied at the Tanglewood Music Festival with William Bolcom and Bernard Rands.

Career

He is composer-in-residence at the Fort Worth Symphony and has received a commission from the Aspen Music Festival. His Cello Concerto was premiered by Yo-Yo Ma. Puts' works have been performed by the St. Louis Symphony, the Pacific Symphony, the Utah Symphony (with Evelyn Glennie as percussion soloist), the Miró Quartet, and Concertante. He is a frequent composer in residence at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, which commissioned his fourth symphony and his flute concerto. His alma mater reports: Puts was Associate Professor of Composition at the University of Texas at Austin from 1997 to 2005 and now teaches composition at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University. His notable students include Jake Runestad and Viet Cuong. The opera Silent Night, with score by Puts and libretto by Mark Campbell, was published by Aperto Press in 2011 and premiered by the Minnesota Opera on November 12. Puts won the annual Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2012; the citation called the piece "a stirring opera that recounts the true story of a spontaneous ceasefire [the 1914 Christmas truce] among Scottish, French and Germans during World War I, displaying versatility of style and cutting straight to the heart." Puts's opera The Hours, with libretto by Greg Pierce, was first performed in concert form in Philadelphia at the Kimmel Center in March 2022, and then fully staged in November 2022 at the New York Metropolitan Opera. His triple concerto Contact won the 2023 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition.

Awards

Selected works

Orchestra

Wind ensemble

SATB choir

Concertos

Song cycle

Opera