"Music's biggest night" this year is in the books, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and its alliance partners have plenty to celebrate. 

Composer and SFCM professor Jake Heggie.

At the 68th GRAMMY Awards, the biggest win came from SFCM itself: Composition faculty Jake Heggie took home an award—his first!—for Best Opera Recording for Intelligence, a commision by Houston Grand Opera that premiered in 2023. Inspired by the true story of two Civil War spies, Elizabeth Van Lew and Mary Jane Bowse, Intelligence's win also includes librettist Gene Scheer, director and choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, and the HGO Orchestra under the baton of Kwamé Ryan. The album was recorded live during the opera's world premiere run at the Wortham Theater Center in fall 2023 and released in August 2025.

Heggie explained that Intelligence's subject matter was suggested to him by a Smithsonian Institution docent at an event in Washington, D.C. Digging into the story of the two women at the heart of the opera, Heggie said his "jaw was on the floor." As mentioned, this is Heggie's first GRAMMY: He was previously nominated for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for his opera Great Scott at the 61st GRAMMYs and Unexpected Shadows (Best Classical Solo Vocal Album) at the 64th awards. (The latter was a PENTATONE Records release.)

Meanwhile, SFCM Piano faculty Garrick Ohlsson shares in Elaine Martone's win for Producer of the Year, Classical for his role as soloist on Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 27 & Symphony No. 29 with the Franz Welser-Möst & The Cleveland Orchestra.

PENTATONE Records is celebrating a GRAMMY for Cerrone: Don't Look Down, performed by Sandbox Percussion, which won for Best Engineered Album, Classical. The record was engineered by Mike Tierney and mastered by Alan Silverman, and also received nominations for Best Classical Compendium and Best Contemporary Classical Composition.

"On a cold night in 2022, I heard [this] work live at the Interlochen Arts Academy," the label's Managing Director, Sean Hickey, said. "A day later, I was in touch with the composer and ensemble, and not long after we scheduled this extraordinarily fresh and thrilling album for PENTATONE. Congratulations to Mike Tierney and Alan Silverman for capturing this brilliant ensemble and the composer's work so vividly."

Askonas Holt and Opus 3 Artists celebrated a number of wins in their rosters as well, with Yo-Yo Ma, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Yuja Wang, and Alisa Weilerstein honored. Ma won for Best Classical Instrumental Solo (Shostakovich: The Cello Concertos); the LAMC for Best Choral Performance (Ortiz: Yanga); Weilerstein for Best Contemporary Classical Composition (Ortiz: Dzonot, shared with Gabriela Ortiz and Gustavo Dudamel & the Los Angeles Philharmonic); and Wang for Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra's win for Best Orchestral Performance for Messiaen: Turangalîla-Symphonie.

Opus 3 Artists, PENTATONE, and Askonas Holt make up SFCM's extraordinary alliance of music-industry partners. Acquired in 2020 and 2022, respectively, the companies have built SFCM into one of the world's largest performing-arts organizations and provide not only unparalleled educational access to some of the most prominent working musicians of their era, but professional on-ramps into the worlds of arts management and recording for SFCM students. For examples of how the SFCM alliance uplifted the Conservatory student experience in 2025, click here.

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