The prize is named for Harvard Mahoney Neuroscience Institute Co-founder David Mahoney.
It honors individuals who have significantly increased public awareness about brain science and disorders of the nervous system. This fall, we celebrated 2024 recipient Renée Fleming.
2024 Recipient | Renée Fleming
For her extraordinary commitment to research advocacy at the intersection of music, health, and neuroscience.
Renée Fleming is one of the most highly acclaimed singers of our time, performing on the stages of the world’s great opera houses and concert halls. A 2023 Kennedy Center Honoree and winner of five Grammy® Awards and the U.S. National Medal of Arts, she has sung for momentous occasions from the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony to the Super Bowl. In 2023, she received the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum in Davos, and the World Health Organization appointed her as Goodwill Ambassador for Arts and Health.
Fleming’s anthology, Music and Mind: Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness, was published in April. She is a prominent advocate for research at the intersection of arts, health, and neuroscience, and as an artistic adviser to the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Fleming launched the first ongoing collaboration between America’s national cultural center and its largest health research institute, the National Institutes of Health. She created her own program, Music and Mind, which she has presented in more than 60 cities around the world. She is now a founding adviser for major initiatives in the field, including the Sound Health Network at UC San Francisco and the NeuroArts Blueprint with Johns Hopkins University and The Aspen Institute.
In 2023 Fleming received the Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Solo for her album Voice of Nature: The Anthropocene, with Yannick Nézet-Séguin as pianist. She is currently touring with a concert program inspired by the album, which features a special film created for the performance by the National Geographic Society. In May at the Metropolitan Opera, Fleming starred in The Hours, an opera based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and award-winning film. Last year, Decca released a special double-length album of live recordings from her iconic performances at the Metropolitan Opera, titled Renée Fleming: Greatest Moments at the Met. Her voice is featured on the soundtracks of Best Picture Oscar winners The Shape of Water and The Lord of the Rings.
An adviser for special projects at LA Opera, Fleming is also co-artistic director of the Aspen Opera Center and VocalARTS at the Aspen Music Festival and School. Fleming’s other awards include the Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal and honorary doctorates from ten leading universities, including Harvard. www.reneefleming.com
Past Recipients
HMNI’s David Mahoney Prize is awarded every two years to individuals who excel at building a bridge between the public and the scientists dedicated to brain research.