Osvaldo Golijov is an Argentine-born composer whose eclectic voice blends classical chamber music, Jewish liturgical traditions, klezmer, tango, and Latin American folk forms. Raised in La Plata in a Jewish family with Eastern European roots, his mother was a piano teacher and his father a physician. He studied composition privately with Gerardo Gandini in Argentina before moving to Israel in 1983 to study with Mark Kopytman at the Jerusalem Rubin Academy. In 1986 he emigrated to the United States and earned a PhD in composition at the University of Pennsylvania under George Crumb. He later studied at Tanglewood with Oliver Knussen and Lukas Foss, receiving the Serge Koussevitzky Composition Prize in 1990.

A 2003 MacArthur fellow, Golijov has received numerous honors including two Grammys in 2007 for Ainadamar—Best Opera Recording and Best Classical Contemporary Composition. His major works include La Pasión según San Marcos (2000), which became a landmark of contemporary music, and the opera Ainadamar (2003). He has taught at the College of the Holy Cross since 1991. His recent works include LAIꓘA, premiered in early 2025, and the Megalopolis Suite, commissioned and premiered by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Riccardo Muti in 2024.