Congratulations to composer, pianist, and singer Gabriel Kahane, a recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters' Charles Ives Fellowship. Kahane is one of eighteen recipients of the Academy's 2021 music awards. Harmony Ives, the widow of Charles Ives, bequeathed to the Academy the royalties of Charles Ives’s music, which has enabled the Academy to give awards in composition since 1970, including two Charles Ives Fellowships of $15,000 each.

Candidates for music awards are nominated by the 300 members of the Academy—which includes Laurie Anderson and Terry Riley as of last year—and the winners were selected by a committee of Academy members. The awards will be presented virtually at the Academy's Ceremonial on May 19, 2021.

The American Academy of Arts and Letters was founded in 1898 as an honor society of the country’s leading architects, artists, composers, and writers. Early members include William Merritt Chase, Childe Hassam, Julia Ward Howe, Henry James, Edward MacDowell, Theodore Roosevelt, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, John Singer Sargent, Mark Twain, and Edith Wharton. The Academy’s 300 members are elected for life and pay no dues.

In addition to electing new members as vacancies occur, the Academy seeks to foster and sustain an interest in Literature, Music, and the Fine Arts by administering over 70 awards and prizes, exhibiting art and manuscripts, funding performances of new works of musical theater, and purchasing artwork for donation to museums across the country.

For more information, visit artsandletters.org.