Nationally acclaimed composer Gabriela Lena Frank, who is currently University Artist in Residence at University of the Pacific, has won the 2026 Pulitzer Prize in Music, officials announced Monday.

Her composition, “Picaflor: A Future Myth,” was inspired by Frank’s personal experiences with California wildfires. It includes ten movements that follow a hummingbird, Picaflor, through its attempts to navigate a changing and challenging world while questioning what the future holds.

“I am honored and rather speechless to win this year’s Pulitzer Prize in Music,” Frank said. “I think of my younger self, how I made the decision to pursue the exploration of my Peruvian-indigenous heritage even as surely, that meant I would find few listeners. Instead, over my working life as a composer, I have encountered a world that, even as it struggles to know and name itself, is making room for voices like mine. I’m grateful.”

The work, which premiered in March 2025 by the Philadelphia Orchestra, draws from Andean Peruvian mythology, centering on the legends of a sky kingdom ruled by a sun god creator and the messengers of the Inca Empire. A common theme throughout the composition is the belief that significant transformations happen every few hundred years. 

Frank says the elements in the storytelling reflect her own commitment to activism and her pride as a generational daughter of Indigenous Perú. 

“We’re elated,” said Conservatory of Music Dean Peter Witte. “Gabriela Lena Frank’s 2026 Pulitzer is the most recent affirmation of her gifts as cultural witness, a creator of orchestral color and, at Pacific, as an educator who is down to earth, approachable and simply brilliant.” 

Raised in Northern California, Frank has brought her expertise and multicultural knowledge to Pacific as part of the Inclusive Music Initiative, a partnership launched in fall 2025 between the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music and Pacific’s Conservatory of Music. The initiative aims to elevate musical traditions that are often underrepresented in American classrooms and performance spaces, emphasizing collaboration and community engagement.

Frank has worked closely with students throughout the year, teaching composition, coaching small ensembles, lecturing in music management courses and speaking with Pacific’s cultural communities. Students also serve as interns with the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy, learning with alumni composers and partnering in recording sessions of new works. 

“Hearing about her embracing both parts of her cultures into her own unique and very successful music was really important for me,” said Caroline Poso ’28, a music therapy major. “To see a woman with a similar background to myself doing so well was empowering, and hearing about her journey learning about her cultures made me feel validated in my journey with exploring my own cultures and identity.”

In February, the Guggenheim Fellow and Latin Grammy winner was a featured speaker in the Pacific Presidential Speaker Series, where she engaged in a thought-provoking discussion with Witte on cultural heritage and the arts.

Most recently, students traveled to Chicago to attend a premiere of Frank’s opera “El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego” at the Lyrics Opera House. The piece is a magical-realist portrait of Mexico’s Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, with libretto by Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Nilo Cruz.

Students and faculty will travel to New York May 29-31 to see its debut at the Metropolitan Opera House.

Related news:

NPR: "Gabriela Lena Frank wins music Pulitizer for ‘Picaflor: A future myth”

New York Times: “A musical fable of environmental cataclysm wins Pulitizer Prize”