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Hearing The Pulitzers

Hearing The Pulitzers

Written by: hearingthepulitzers
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Hearing the Pulitzers: A piece-by-piece, episode-by-episode exploration of the winners of the Pulitzer Prize in Music with hosts Andrew Granade and David Thurmaier.Copyright HTP 2025 All rights reserved. Music
Episodes
  • Episode 65 - 2007: Ornette Coleman, Sound Grammar
    Feb 14 2026

    In this episode, Dave and Andrew listen to the first work without a written score to ever win a Pulitzer, Ornette Coleman's album Sound Grammar. What will they think about this new direction for the prize? And it wouldn't be Hearing the Pulitzers without discussing some drama from the judges! We also discuss a special certificate granted to a deserving late jazz musician.

    If you'd like more information about Ornette Coleman, we recommend:

    1. Stephen Rush's book Free Jazz, Harmolodics, and Ornette Coleman (Routledge, 2016)
    2. Michael Stephan's book Experiencing Ornette Coleman: A Listener's Companion (Rowman and Littlefield, 2017)
    3. Nathan Frink's dissertation "Dancing in His Head: The Evolution of Ornette Coleman's Music and Compositional Philosophy" (University of Pittsburgh, 2016)
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    25 mins
  • Episode 64 - 2006: Yehudi Wyner, Piano Concerto: 'Chiavi in Mano'
    Dec 19 2025

    In this episode, Dave and Andrew discuss a piano concerto that the composer, Yehudi Wyner, said "permits expression of the raunchy as well as the refined." How will that duality sit with the hosts? Why doesn't a distinguished composer like Wyner get more performances?? And what former PP winners make an appearance in the episode?

    If you'd like more information about Yehudi Wyner, we recommend:

    • June Yin-Hsuan Chen's dissertation, "Analysis of Yehudi Wyner's Piano Concerto, 'Chiavi in Mano'"
    • Chapter 17: "A Tale of Two Concertos: The Piano Concertos of Yehudi Wyner and Bernard Rands" in Observations on Music, Culture, and Politics by Daniel Asia
    • David Cleary's "An Intoxicating Wyner at 70" in The New Music Connoisseur 8, no. 2 (2000) 9–10.
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    26 mins
  • Bonus: Giants in the Earth Revisited
    Nov 20 2025

    In 2020, Dave and Andrew released their 9th episode, covering Douglas Moore's forgotten opera Giants in the Earth without being able to hear it or even see the score. Now, after 50 years after the last performance, Giants in the Earth has appeared again in a new production by the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra. Will it be a hit or a miss?

    If you'd like to know more about the performance, we recommend:

    1. Information about the live performance by the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra
    2. The streaming performance of Giants in the Earth
    3. Joshua Barone's coverage of the performance in the New York Times, "An Operatic ‘Diamond on the Side of the Road’ Catches Light Again."
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    18 mins
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