The American composer Richard Wilson will give a talk on the music of Robert Moevs (1920–2007), whose long association with the American Academy in Rome began when he received the Rome Prize in 1952. The creator of a rich body of orchestral, chamber, vocal, and instrumental music, Moevs received major performances by Leonard Bernstein and the Symphony of the Air, George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra, and Erich Leinsdorf and the Boston Symphony. His piano concerto won the Stockhausen International Prize in Composition in 1978. Moevs taught at Harvard University and Rutgers University and was composer in residence at the Academy in 1960–61.

Wilson is Mary Conover Mellon Professor of Music at Vassar College. He also serves as composer in residence with the American Symphony Orchestra.