Winner of numerous prestigious awards, including the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for his debut opera Silent Night, Kevin Puts’s works have been commissioned, performed, and recorded by leading ensembles, and soloists throughout the world, including Yo-Yo Ma, Jeffrey Kahane, Dame Evelyn Glennie, the New York Philharmonic, the Tonhalle Orchester (Zurich), the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Miro Quartet, and the symphony orchestras of Baltimore, Cincinnati, Detroit, Atlanta, Colorado, Houston, Fort Worth, St. Louis, and Minnesota. His orchestral work, The City, was co-commissioned by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in honor of its 100th anniversary and by Carnegie Hall in honor of its 125th anniversary. Silent Night, commissioned and premiered by Minnesota Opera, has been produced at Fort Worth Opera, Cincinnati Opera, the Wexford Opera Festival, Calgary Opera, Montreal Opera, the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Atlanta Opera, Opera San Jose, and Michigan Opera Theatre. In 2013, his choral works To Touch The Sky and If I Were A Swan were performed and recorded by Conspirare. His second opera, also commissioned by Minnesota Opera, The Manchurian Candidate, based on the novel, had its world premiere in 2015. A vocal work for Soprano Renee Fleming and orchestra, based on the personal letters of Georgia O’Keeffe, had its world premiere in New York in 2016 and his first chamber opera, an adaptation of Peter Ackroyd’s gothic novel The Trial of Elizabeth Cree commissioned by Opera Philadelphia had its world premiere in 2017. A former Composer-in-Residence of Young Concerts Artists, he is currently a member of the composition department at the Peabody Institute and the director of the Minnesota Orchestra Composer’s Institute.
During residency, Kevin Puts completed his "Percussion Concerto" for premiere by Evelyn Glennie and the Pacific Symphony Orchestra in April 2006. He also began work on a cello concerto for Yo-Yo Ma and the Aspen Music Festival Orchestra that was premiered in June 2006.
