Nicolás Lell Benavides, Composer
Photography by Samantha Godoy
Nicolás Lell Benavides
2025 - 2026 COMPOSER-IN-RESIDENCE
Nicolás Lell Benavides’ music has been praised for being “resourceful and wonderfully eclectic” (Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle) and “dramatically tight and musically transporting” (SF Chronicle). He is a 2024-25 Guggenheim Fellow and has received commissions from groups like The New York Philharmonic/The Juilliard School, the LA Philharmonic with Gustavo Dudamel, Eighth Blackbird, New Century Chamber Orchestra with Daniel Hope, SFCM Orchestra with Edwin Outwater, West Edge Opera, Washington National Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, Music of Remembrance, Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Fry Street Quartet, Friction Quartet, Brightwork newmusic, and Khemia Ensemble. His music has received support from organizations such as the American Composers Forum, The Barlow Endowment, New Music USA, Opera America, the Alice M. Ditson Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Nicolás’ Guggenheim Fellowship will allow him to focus on upcoming projects including his Barlow Foundation commission for Eighth Blackbird, a new song cycle to premiere with the LA Phil based on Neruda’s poetry (Sueño en mi sueño) for oboist Anne Marie Gabriele and tenor Joshua Blue commissioned by Elizabeth and Justus Schlichting, and his opera Dolores. His opera about civil rights icon Dolores Huerta, commissioned by West Edge Opera, will also premiere with San Diego Opera, The BroadStage, and Opera Southwest beginning in 2025. Dolores, with libretto by Marella Martin Koch, tells the story of a pivotal moment in civil and labor rights when the Dolores Huerta, César Chávez, and Larry Itliong coordinated the United Farm Workers to fight for Senator Bobby Kennedy be elected president to help with the Delano Grape Strike and Boycott. He is also developing an opera called Caravana de mujeres with librettist Laura Barati as part of MassOpera’s New Opera Workshop, which was a featured performance at Opera America’s New Works Forum.
He recently premiered Querencia with the New York Philharmonic and The Juilliard School Pre-College program, with support from the American Composers Forum as part of Composing Inclusion. He was a fellow at the Eighth Blackbird Creative Lab and the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music, where he was part of the Composing Earth initiative. Nicolás was the first ever Young Artist Composer in Residence at The Glimmerglass Festival and has been a fellow at the Del Mar International Composers Symposium. His music has been heard all over the United States, including in Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, and as part of the California Festival with New Century Chamber Orchestra and The San Francisco Girls Chorus. He was the first featured composer/conductor with the San Diego Symphony’s Currents Series in the new Jacobs Center.
He premiered a new opera for Washington National Opera called Pepito with librettist Marella Martin Koch. He and Marella also premiered a new opera, Tres minutos, with Music of Remembrance in 2022 with generous support from the National Endowment for the Arts. Other upcoming projects include an upcoming album (Canto Caló) on Aerocade Records with Friction Quartet and mezzo-soprano Melinda Martinez Becker, a new work for Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Phil with filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu, and a new song cycle for mezzo-soprano Kelley O’Connor.Nicolás has studied at Santa Clara University, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music.
ABOUT THE COMPOSER-IN-RESIDENCE PROGRAM
The San Francisco Girls Chorus Composer-in-Residence program gives our young singers a chance to learn more about the process of creating new music. Collaborating with modern composers, gives our members access to fresh, contemporary perspectives on the world through music. During the year-long residency, the Composer visits rehearsals, meets with Level Directors, and creates a new work expressly for the Chorus School, engaging each group at their own musical level, reaching out to musical minds spanning a broad age range. As The excellent training of our members gives the composer dynamic possibilities in composing for young girls' voices, finding new and colorful ways to bring this unique instrument into the broader musical life of the San Francisco Bay Area.