One of the US's leading composers, and a Pulitzer Prize winner, Steven Stucky has died at the age of 66. Born in Hutchinson, Kansas and raised in Kansas and Texas, Stucky studied at Baylor and Cornell universities where his teachers included Richard Willis, Robert Palmer, Karel Husa and Burrill Phillips. He held positions with many of the major American orchestras including the Los Angeles PO (resident composer 1988-2009) and the Pittsburgh Symphony (Composer of the Year 2011-12). He taught at Cornell University (Given Foundation Professor of Composition), Eastman (Visiting Professor of Composition, 2001-2) and Berkeley (Ernest Bloch Professor in 2003); in 2014 he joined the composition faculty at the Juilliard School in New York. He was also the artist-faculty composer in residence at the Aspen Music Festival and School.

His compositional output was extensive embracing symphonic pieces, a number of concertos, an opera (The Classical Style to a libretto by Jeremy Denk after the book by Charles Rosen), a large number of chamber works, song settings and choral works. It was his Concerto for Orchestra of 2003 that brought him his Pulitzer Prize. 

He was also an authority on the music of the Polish composer Witold Lutosławski, and in this capacity he curated the Philharmonia Orchestra's centenary celebrations in 2013.