Claudio Spies was born in Chile in 1925; he has lived in the United States since 1942 and became an American citizen in 1966. Raised by parents of German-Jewish origin he speaks fluent English, Spanish, German, Italian and French, and has made great compositional use of these linguistic skills. He has set texts in all these languages but French, and has also set texts in Latin. Half of his output, in fact, consists of vocal music, and is marked by careful attention to prosody and the characteristic rhythms and syntax of the language being set.