Virgil Thomson was a multi-faceted, highly original American composer and distinguished music critic. Born in Kansas City (Missouri) on 25 November 1896, he studied at Harvard University. After spending several years in Paris, where he studied with Nadia Boulanger and met Cocteau, Stravinsky, Satie and Les Six, he returned to the United States where he became head music critic for the New York Herald Tribune.

Thomson’s work is informed by a vast range of musical styles. An exceptionally intelligent and spirited personality, his highly original compositions explore the rhythms of American spoken vernaculars and the harmonies of sacred music. He was notably influenced by the clarity, simplicity, irony, and humour of the music of Erik Satie. His most well-known works include the operas Four Saints in Three Acts and The Mother of Us All (both with libretti by Gertrude Stein, with whom Thomson maintained a close artistic relationship), and film scores for The Plow That Broke the Plains, The River(both directed by Pare Lorentz), andLouisiana Story (directed by Robert Flaherty). He was also the author of eight books, including an autobiography.

He received numerous awards throughout his career, including a Pulitzer Prize, the Brandeis Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal, the National Book Circle Award, Kennedy Center Honors, and the National Music Council Award, as well as 20 honourary doctorates.

Thomson died on 30 September 1989 in New York at the age of 92.