Larsen studied at the University of Minnesota (B.A., 1971; M.M., 1975; Ph.D., 1978), where her teachers included Dominick Argento, Paul Fetler, and Eric Stokes. In 1973 with Stephen Paulus she founded the Minnesota (now American) Composers’ Forum in Minneapolis. From 1983 to 1987 she was Composer-in-Residence with the Minnesota Orchestra.
For the stage she has composed eleven operas: The Words Upon the Windowpane (W. B. Yeats) in one act, produced in Minneapolis in 1978; a one-act children’s...