Alumni from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music were well represented at the 67th annual Grammy Awards with composer and violinist Caroline Shaw ’04 earning her fifth Grammy for “Rectangles and Circumstance” in the Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance category. It is Shaw’s second Grammy in that category and fifth overall with awards in 2024, 2022, 2020 and 2014.
Shaw, a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, has built a reputation for pushing the boundaries of classical music. Her genre-defying work has led to collaborations with artists such as Rosalía, Renée Fleming and Yo-Yo Ma, and her compositions have been featured in film and television including “Fleishman is in Trouble,” “Bombshell,” “Yellowjackets” and Beyoncé’s “Homecoming.” A former violin student of Kathleen Winkler, the Dorothy Richard Starling Professor of Classical Violin, Shaw holds an honorary doctorate from Yale University and was the youngest recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for music for “Partita for 8 Voices” in 2013.
Shepherd School alumni were also well represented across Grammy-winning recordings. Graduates contributed as members of major orchestras featured on award-winning performances by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.
In addition to winners, Shepherd School alumni were among this year’s nominees. Blanton Alspaugh ’87, an 11-time Grammy-winning producer, was nominated in Best Opera Recording for “Moravec: The Shining” and Best Classical Compendium for “American Counterpoints.” A former conducting student of Samuel Jones, the first dean of the Shepherd School, Alspaugh is recognized for his expertise in classical music production, earning three awards in the Producer of the Year, Classical category throughout his career.