Visionary Awards

The Composers Now Visionary Award recognizes members of the arts community who, through their own creative practice and advocacy for others, have made a profound, positive and lasting impact on our culture.  Composers Now presents the Visionary Awards each year at the Composers Now Festival Opening Event.


2023 Recipients:

Ellen Taaffe Zwilich

Adolphus Hailstork

(video by Bill Doggett)


2022 Recipients:

Mary D. Watkins

"Mamie's Lament" from Emmet Till: The Opera
Lucia Bradford, mezzo-soprano

"Pap's Song" from
Dark River: The Fannie Lou Hamer Story
Philip Lima, baritone
Andrea Chinedu Nwoke, soprano
Mount Holyoke Symphony Orchestra
Ng Tian Hui, conductor

Darryl V. Jones, director
(dress rehearsal, April 2014)

David Del Tredici

(video courtesy of Boosey & Hawkes)


2021 Recipient:

Joan Tower

"Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman" (1986)
São Paulo Symphony Orchestra


2020 Recipient:

Carman Moore

Carman Moore

Award presented by Henry Threadgill


2019 Recipients:

Laura Kaminsky T.J. Anderson
Laura Kaminsky T.J. Anderson

2018 Recipients:

Cecille Wasserman Frank J. Oteri
photo by Caroline Conejero  photo by Jeffrey Herman
Cecille Wasserman Frank J. Oteri

2017 Recipients:

Muhal Richard Abrams Thomas Buckner Pauline Oliveros
Muhal Richard Abrams Thomas Buckner Pauline Oliveros

2016 Recipients:

John Duffy Frances Richard
John Duffy Frances Richard