Leon Kirchner in the context of "John Adams (composer)"

John Coolidge Adams (born February 15, 1947) is an American composer and conductor. Among the most regularly performed composers of contemporary classical music, he is particularly noted for his operas, many of which center around historical events. Apart from opera, his oeuvre includes orchestral, concertante, vocal, choral, chamber, electroacoustic, and piano music.

Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Adams grew up in a musical family and was exposed to classical music, jazz, musical theatre, and rock music. He attended Harvard University, studying with Leon Kirchner, Roger Sessions, and David Del Tredici, among others. His earliest work was aligned with modernist music, but he began to disagree with its tenets upon reading John Cage's Silence: Lectures and Writings. Teaching at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Adams developed a minimalist aesthetic first fully realized in Phrygian Gates (1977) and later in the string septet Shaker Loops. Adams became increasingly active in San Francisco's contemporary music scene, and his orchestral works Harmonium (1980–1981) and Harmonielehre (1985) first gained him national attention. Other popular works from this time include the fanfare Short Ride in a Fast Machine (1986) and the orchestral work El Dorado (1991).