Gene Scheer

Librettist and composer Gene Scheer is celebrated for his scope and versatility. Scheer has frequently collaborated with composer Jake Heggie such as on the operas Moby-Dick and Three Decembers, the lyric dramas To Hell and Back and For a Look or Touch, and a number of song cycles including Camille Claudel: Into the Fire, which received its premiere by Joyce Di Donato and the Alexander Quartet. Scheer also worked as a librettist with Tobias Picker on An American Tragedy, which premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in 2005. Picker and Scheer’s first opera together, Thérèse Raquin, was cited by Opera News as one of the ten best recordings of 2002.

Other notable collaborations for Scheer include the lyrics for Jennifer Higdon’s opera Cold Mountain, Wynton Marsalis’s song It Never Goes Away and Steven Stucky’s oratorio August 4, 1964. Also a composer in his own right, Scheer has written a number of songs for vocalists such as Renée Fleming, Sylvia McNair, Stephanie Blythe, Jennifer Larmore, Denyce Graves, and Nathan Gunn. The distinguished documentary filmmaker Ken Burns prominently featured Mr. Scheer’s song “American Anthem,” sung by Norah Jones, in his Emmy Award-winning documentary The War.