Skipping the whole ‘years of rejection while starving in an unheated garret’ routine, Wheeler alum Nico Muhly is going straight to the top of the heap, garnering special notice in today’s New York Times “Best of 2013″ section for his recent work at the Metropolitan Opera. Zachary Woolfe writes about the promising thirty-somethings in the world of classical music, ” The polymathic Nico Muhly, born in 1981, became the youngest composer to have a commissioned work performed at the Metropolitan Opera when his “Two Boys” had its American premiere in October.” From the original review,
Nico Muhly has a voice, a Muhly sound, and it comes through consistently in his opera “Two Boys,” a dark, ambitious and innovative work that had its much anticipated American premiere on Monday night at the Metropolitan Opera. With a libretto by the acclaimed playwright Craig Lucas, the opera, based on real events 10 years ago in Manchester, England, tells the story of a 16-year-old boy who nearly killed a younger boy — egged on, the attacker claimed, by mysterious people he encountered in an Internet chat room.
Muhly — the son of artist Bunny Harvey and documentary filmmaker Frank Muhly — graduated from Columbia receiving a Masters in Music from Juilliard in 2004. He worked for Philip Glass as a MIDI programmer and editor for six years, and according to his Wiki bio Nico sang in the choir at Grace Episcopal Church.