Steven Stucky, a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and the Given Foundation Professor of Composition at Cornell, will be the new chair of the board of the American Music Center (AMC) beginning July 1.

He will serve as AMC's public face and primary representative for its membership of more than 2,000 composers, new music performers, music industry professionals and organizations, and will preside at AMC's annual meeting and awards ceremony and at board meetings.

The AMC, founded in 1939, is dedicated to building a national community of artists, organizations and audiences focused on new American music. Stucky said his main order of business is to increase awareness and visibility for what AMC does. "I want more people to know what we already do and focus on quality, service and activism in our community," he said.

The experience Stucky brings to AMC includes his advocacy efforts as composer-in-residence at the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the past 20 years and hosting the New York Philharmonic's critically acclaimed Hear and Now series. A Cornell professor since 1980, he has been an important mentor to emerging composers for decades.

His own compositions include the frequently performed string quartet "Nell'ombra nella luce" and the 2005 Pulitzer Prize-winning Second Concerto for Orchestra, which was described in The New York Times as "an electrifying piece ... [that] stands apart from academic disputes about style and language, and strives for direct communication." This summer, the New York Philharmonic will perform his new orchestral work, "Rhapsodies," throughout Europe, and the Dallas Symphony will perform his "August 4, 1964," written in honor of the centennial of the birth of Lyndon B. Johnson.