“Arguably the world's most popular 21st-century opera and art song composer…”
The Wall Street Journal
Jake Heggie is the American composer of ten full-length operas, including Dead Man Walkingand Great Scott with librettos by Terrence McNally; Moby-Dick, Three Decembers, It’s a Wonderful Life, Intelligence, If I Were You, and Two Remain with librettos by Gene Scheer; and numerous one-acts. He has also composed nearly 300 art songs, as well as chamber, choral, and orchestral works. Heggie is proud to serve as the Diane B. Wilsey Distinguished Professor of Composition at San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
Heggie opens the 26/27 season with The Judgment of Paris, his most recent collaboration with librettist Gene Scheer. Inspired by the legendary 1976 blind tasting that transformed the world of wine, the opera premieres in both America and France – as part of Festival Napa Valley’s 20th anniversary season and at Opéra Royal Château de Versailles. The Olivier Award-winning production of Dead Man Walking from English National Opera travels to Opera North, while a new production is mounted at the Seagle Festival. Elsewhere, two new productions of Before It All Goes Dark, open at Theater Koblenz and Piedmont Opera, where it will be presented in a double-bill with Another Sunrise during the company’s 50th anniversary season. The monodrama Earth 2.0 opens Aspen Summer Music Festival’s season before traveling to the Bellingham Festival of Music. Additionally, Heggie works appear at Tulsa Opera, Staunton Music Festival, Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, and Zephyr Symphony.
Portraits by James Niebuhr
Next Engagement
For a Look or a Touch
Staunton Music Festival
Directed by Timothy Nelson; Featuring Rob McGinness, Doug Schneider
August 16, 17, 2026
Staunton / USA
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Featured Works
Dead Man Walking
With over 80 productions globally, this opera is based on the work of Sister Helen Prejean, telling the journey of a Louisiana nun who becomes the spiritual advisor to a convicted murderer on death row.
Live recordings from San Francisco Opera and Houston Grand Opera have been released on Erato and Virgin Classics, respectively, and the work’s development was chronicled in the Emmy-nominated documentary And Then One Night: The Making of Dead Man Walking.
Songs for Murdered Sisters
This 28-minute song cycle for baritone and piano or orchestra — with searing words by Margaret Atwood – was created to wake people up to the global epidemic of gender-based violence.
Already an album and a film, the work received its fully orchestrated world premiere in February 2023 with Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra and baritone Joshua Hopkins, for whom the work was composed.
Earth 2.0
This monodrama for countertenor (or soprano) and orchestra was commissioned by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra for Key’mon Murrah, with a libretto by Anita Amirrezvani. It features choreography by Jawole Willa Jo Zollar and dancers from Urban Bush Women.
The world premiere was presented in December 2024 by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, with subsequent performances by co-commissioner Grand Rapids Symphony, and Aspen Music Festival & School in a future season.
Offstage
Jake Heggie is a frequent collaborator with educational institutions and other performing arts organizations, undertaking artist residencies, serving as mentorship faculty, and offering master classes to performers and creators.
For more information on offstage appearances, contact Jake using this form.
Production Images
