Michael Abels

DSO presents 2025-2026 Composer-in-Residence's first work of the season, Unbound, Oct. 9-11 in Orchestra Hall. 

By: Hannah Engwall Elbialy

When audiences hear the music of Michael Abels, they are immediately drawn into a journey—sometimes haunting, sometimes joyful, always deeply human. The Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, best known for his work on the opera Omar (co-composed by Rhiannon Giddens and Abels), and his groundbreaking film scores for Jordan Peele’s Get Out, Us, and Nope, has long balanced the worlds of concert music and cinema. In the 2025–26 season, the DSO is proud to welcome Abels as Composer-in-Residence, offering audiences the chance to experience the breadth of his work live in Orchestra Hall.

“It’s a huge honor,” Abels says. “I feel like the Detroit Symphony has been one of the home ensembles for me through my career—an ensemble that really gets me. That’s a really nice feeling.”

The DSO has performed several of Abels’s works in past seasons, but the residency marks the most significant collaboration to date. Over the course of the season, audiences will hear five of his compositions, ranging from early milestones to fresh premieres. For Abels, the programming highlights the central theme of variety: “I’ve written in various genres and for various media, so you’re going to get a little bit of everything this season.”

Among the works to be performed is Unbound, a short but powerful tribute to Olympic champion Jesse Owens. Audiences will also hear Global Warming (1991), one of Abels’s earliest orchestral successes. Written in the hopeful years following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the piece celebrates shared cultural threads across global folk traditions while reflecting on a rapidly changing world. Abels calls it the first piece where he “understood who I am”—a work that, decades later, still resonates.

The DSO will also perform More Seasons, Abels’s playful deconstruction of Vivaldi’s famous concertos. He describes it as “Vivaldi in a Mixmaster,” subjecting familiar themes to minimalist twists and surprising turns. Family audiences can look forward to Frederick’s Fables, a delightful work for narrator and orchestra based on the award-winning children’s stories of Leo Lionni. “These were favorites of mine growing up,” Abels recalls. “Now I get to help introduce them to young audiences in a way that shows how well an orchestra can take a story and make it live, along with narration.”

Perhaps the most anticipated event of the residency will be the world premiere of a new orchestral suite from Omar, the opera that won Giddens and Abels the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in Music. The suite brings the opera’s powerful themes and melodies into the concert hall, where the orchestra will take center stage. “In opera, many of the most memorable melodies are given to the voice,” Abels explains. “In the orchestral suite, the orchestra takes on the leading role in all of those melodies that people remembered and fell in love with. I’m really looking forward to letting the orchestra completely shine through in this work that means so much to me.”

Born in Phoenix and raised in rural South Dakota, Abels studied at the University of Southern California and the California Institute of the Arts. His music reflects a wide-ranging curiosity: classical structures infused with elements of jazz, gospel, hip-hop, and world music. “When I was in school, I was afraid that my interest in different genres was a bad thing,” he admits. “But then I realized I use genre the way other people use orchestration—it’s a feature of how I approach music. That is my brand.”

Abels’s versatility has allowed him to thrive in multiple spheres. His scores for Jordan Peele’s films brought him international recognition, winning the World Soundtrack Award, the Jerry Goldsmith Award, and numerous critics’ honors. Meanwhile, his concert works have been performed by major orchestras across the country, from Chicago and Cleveland to Philadelphia and Atlanta. He is also co-founder of the Composers Diversity Collective, advocating for greater representation of composers of color in film, gaming, and streaming media. Outside of music, he is an amateur triathlete.

Yet across this wide-ranging output, certain values remain constant. “I want to write music that musicians love playing,” Abels says. “People coming together to play is one of the most magnificent and inspiring things.”

For DSO Music Director Jader Bignamini, Abels is a natural fit. “Michael is a unique figure in the contemporary music scene thanks to his ability to blend different genres into cohesive and deeply expressive compositions,” Bignamini says. “His artistic identity is deeply rooted in his multicultural background and his commitment to diversity and inclusion. Michael is much more than a composer: he is a cultural mediator, a sound innovator, and a promoter of change.”

Bignamini first collaborated with Abels several years ago and immediately sensed a creative kinship. “His artistic vision, human depth, and natural ability to connect with a wide range of audiences make him an ideal partner for an institution that values creativity, openness, and community impact,” he says.

For Abels, the residency is not only about performances, but also about connection—with musicians and audiences. “There is an implied trust between a composer and a listener,” he reflects. “A listener says, ‘I’m interested in you taking me on a journey,’ and I want to honor that trust. At the end of that journey, I want them to feel it was time well spent.”