Julia Wolfe Awarded Two International Residencies for 2025–2026 Season

Wolfe—an influential composer, Pulitzer winner, and NYU Steinhardt professor and artistic director—will be honored in England and Belgium. 

Julia Wolfe, professor and artistic director of Music Composition at NYU Steinhardt and a MacArthur Fellow, has been awarded two international residencies for the 2025–2026 season: one with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and one with the music venue Bozar in Brussels, Belgium.

Wolfe makes history as the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra’s first Composer in Residence. The Orchestra will play four of Wolfe’s pieces at The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, England, including a newly commissioned symphonic arrangement of her Pulitzer-winning Anthracite Fields in March.

“Anthracite Fields has had an incredible life,” says Wolfe of the production, which debuted in 2014 and is based on oral histories and interviews of Pennsylvania coal miners. “It was originally written for the Bang on a Can All-Stars and choir, but the BBC Philharmonic has commissioned a new arrangement for orchestra. Going from a small, amplified ensemble to a live orchestra means I can really dig in to create a different sound world. I have written many orchestral pieces since Anthracite Fields, so coming back to reenvision it is such fun.”

The performance—which Wolfe plans to attend—will also include a video scape by artist Jeff Sugg that includes archival footage from the region.

At Bozar in Brussels, their season will include seven performances of Wolfe’s work, including a concerto for body percussion called Body Language (which Wolfe will attend in January) and a piece for six pianos called my lips from speaking. 

The largest performance at Bozar will be Fire in my mouth in February; this large-scale staged oratorio tells the story of the tragic Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911 in Greenwich Village, very close to where NYU Steinhardt stands today. The piece “draw[s] from traditional Yiddish and Italian melodies, as well as firsthand survivor testimonies [… and] blends raw emotion with a stark evocation of the factory and the fire, creating a haunting and unforgettable experience,” says Bozar’s website.

These two residencies are the latest of several for Wolfe, including the 2022 Debs Chair Composer-in-Residence at Carnegie Hall and serving as Composer-in-Residence at Finland’s Avanti Festival.

“When you take a look at the breadth of someone’s work, you get a sense of their mission and vision, and a sense of their style,” says Wolfe on the impact of residencies. “When I talk to my students about what style is, it’s what an artist keeps coming back to—certain rhythms, textures, sounds, and harmonies that they love. My music is influenced by many, sometimes disparate, musical sources. I love classical music, but I’m also a child of rock and roll. I have a  great deal of experience with American folk music as well. I love the crossing over of different music to evoke something new.”

Wolfe is the recipient of numerous other honors and awards, including Princeton University’s 2022 Madison Medal, the 2020 Brendan Gill Prize, Musical America’s 2019 Composer of the Year, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, among others.