Composition

Composer and keyboardist Wayne Horvitz was associated with the Manhattan downtown scene of experimental composers and improvisers. Now a resident of Seattle, he fuses his diverse musical influences in a new album called The President.

Rhys Chatham is a classically-trained, minimalist composer who incorporates rock influences into his music. He joins Fresh Air to talk about his choice of instrumentation, and the evolution of his work over the years.

Zappa's avant-garde band, the Mothers of Invention, failed to get much airplay, in part because of their explicit lyrics. Zappa now divides his time between studio composition and live performance. He is politically active, and has fought against censorship and encouraged his fans to register to vote.

Sondheim briefly wrote for the television show Topper before becoming the lyricist for the Broadway hits West Side Story and Gypsy. A trained composer, he later began writing his own musicals which, Sondheim says, continued in the Rogers and Hammerstein tradition. They include Sweeney Todd, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and Into the Woods.

Rather than features songs from the 1970s in the recent Patty Hearst biopic, the filmmakers recruited composer Scott Johnson to write the soundtrack. His dense score combines synthesizers with heavy percussion, but retains the accessibility of pop music.

Coleman was a child piano prodigy who has written for Broadway, television and pop artists. Despite his popular success, he says that, in order to keep working, he still has to audition for directors and producers.

Avant-garde composer and saxophonist John Zorn's most recent album reinterprets the music of film composer Ennio Morricone. His forthcoming recording pays homage to detective novelist Mickey Spillane.

New music composer John Harbison was drawn to classical music because the genre leant itself to longer pieces and a deeper exploration of musical ideas. He often writes for his wife, the violinist Rosemary Harbison.

Adams is often associated with other minimalist composers like Philip Glass and Steve Reich. His new album, The Chairman Dances, features parts of his new opera-in-progress called Nixon in China.

Composer John Morris is film director Mel Brooks' longtime collaborator. In addition to writing the music for comedies, Morris also scored David Lynch's The Elephant Man.