Stephen Schwartz To Receive 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award From The Society Of Composers & Lyricists

The Society of Composers & Lyricists will present the 2025 SCL Lifetime Achievement Award to Stephen Schwartz, the three-time Academy Award-winning composer and lyricist whose work includes Wicked, Godspell, Pippin, The Prince of Egypt, and collaborations on Pocahontas, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Enchanted. Schwartz will receive the honor at the SCL’s holiday celebration in New York on December 2.

The organization will also present a 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award to Charles Fox, induct Ennio Morricone and Peggy Lee posthumously into its Hall of Fame, and honor Sara Bareilles with the 2025 Ambassador Award. Steve Dorff will receive the 2025 Trailblazer Award, and Senator Marsha Blackburn will receive special SCL recognition for Excellence in Advocacy. Additional presentations will take place December 6 in Nashville and December 10 in Los Angeles.

Schwartz’s career spans theatre, film, and recording, with accolades including three Academy Awards, four Grammy Awards, a Golden Globe, the Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award, and inductions into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Theatre Hall of Fame. His stage works include Wicked, Godspell, Pippin, The Baker’s Wife, Working, and Children of Eden. For film, his collaborations with Alan Menken produced Academy Award–winning songs “When You Believe” and “Colors of the Wind,” along with music for The Prince of Egypt, Enchanted, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He received an additional Oscar nomination for the score for Wicked in collaboration with John Powell.

Past SCL Lifetime Achievement Award honorees include Giorgio Moroder, Quincy Jones, Danny Elfman, Bill Conti, Philip Glass, Alan Menken, and Ginny Mancini. Morricone and Lee will join the SCL Hall of Fame, whose members are inducted posthumously; Curtin and Stalling were recognized in 2024.

The SCL Ambassador Award has previously gone to Benj Pasek & Justin Paul, Jeff Beal, Marcelo Zarvos, Dave Grusin, Thomas Newman, and Randy Newman. The Trailblazer Award honors composers who have advanced film and television scoring in Nashville.