Derrick Wang

Derrick Wang is an American composer and writer.

Education
Wang graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard College, Harvard University, where he composed works including two musicals for the Hasty Pudding Theatricals. He received a master's degree from the Yale School of Music.

Work
Wang came to international attention as the composer and librettist of Scalia/Ginsburg, the opera about United States Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Both justices wrote forewords to Wang's libretto. One chapter of Ginsburg's 2016 book My Own Words consists of excerpts from the libretto, narrated and performed by Wang in the audiobook. In 2022, Justice Ginsburg's copy of the Scalia/Ginsburg libretto with a one-page autograph manuscript of her handwritten notes was sold at auction for over US$10,000.

In 2024, Opera Delaware premiered Wang's new completion of the opera Turandot, praised as "adept," "respectful," and "seamless."

Wang, a musical dramatist and forensic musicologist, teaches music and law at Johns Hopkins University.