A few years after his father's death, the family moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, where Heggie completed high school and continued his studies in piano.

Unable to continue playing the piano, Heggie pursued a career in public relations, working for the UCLA Performing Center for the Arts.

[5] In consideration of Harris' failing health and Heggie's desire to relocate to San Francisco from Los Angeles, the couple made the mutual decision to separate but remain married.

After being hired, Heggie began composing again, and the focal dystonia in his hand lessened to the extent that he could begin rehabilitating his piano playing.

In the fall of 1994, Heggie began a friendship with mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade when she starred in the world premiere of Conrad Susa's The Dangerous Liaisons.

On opening night, he decided to give her Three Folk Songs as a gift, and when Heggie visited von Stade during intermission, she was playing the arrangements at the piano.

In 1995, with von Stade's encouragement, Heggie entered the Schirmer American Art Song Competition and won with "If you were coming in the fall..." (text by Emily Dickinson).

"[Mansouri] said, 'We have an opening in the 2000 season, and I am going to send you to New York to talk to Terrence McNally because we've wanted to work with him, and I think you two would really hit it off and could come up with something amazing.'

Based on the narrative book by Sister Helen Prejean, it tells the story of a Louisiana nun who becomes the spiritual advisor to a convicted murderer on Angola's death row.

The original version of Dead Man Walking was revised during the East Coast premiere at New York City Opera in September 2002.

'Dead Man Walking'is scheduled to have its Metropolitan Opera debut in 2021 in a new production by Ivo Van Hove, conducted by Yannick Nezet-Seguin.

[11] Several productions of Dead Man Walking have been created, including a widely performed version by director Leonard Foglia with designs by Michael McGarty.

[13] The End of the Affair, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 2003 with a libretto by playwright Heather McDonald, is based on the novel of the same name by Graham Greene.

Set in London during and just after World War II, the opera tells the story of Maurice Bendrix, a writer involved in an illicit love affair with Sarah Miles, the wife of a public servant.

To Hell and Back was commissioned in 2006 by the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra to celebrate its 25th season, and the 20th anniversary of music director Nicholas McGegan.

With a libretto by Gene Scheer, the opera is based on the Greco-Roman myth of Persephone, the goddess of spring, who was abducted to the underworld by the god Pluto and must spend half the year with him there.

D Magazine wrote, "a new chapter in opera history may have opened [with Moby-Dick],"[18] with the Dallas Morning News applauding the work as "a triumph.

It received its highly acclaimed world premiere on April 30, 2010, at the Winspear Opera House in Dallas, Texas, as part of its inaugural season.

Conducted by Patrick Summers and directed by Leonard Foglia, the production featured sets by Robert Brill, projections by Elaine McCarthy, lighting by Donald Holder, and costumes by Jane Greenwood.

The 2012 production of Moby-Dick at San Francisco Opera was featured on Great Performances' 40th Season, telecast nationally in 2013 and subsequently released on DVD (EuroArts).

Scheer based his text on true stories told in the documentary film Paragraph 175 and the journal of Manfred Lewin, from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C.[20] Heggie later adapted For a Look or a Touch for two other performing formats: a stage version with men's choir, and as a song cycle for baritone solo.

Another Sunrise is a dramatic scene for soprano and chamber ensemble (clarinet, violin, cello, bass, and piano) based on the life and work of Holocaust survivor Krystyna Zywulska.

The opera starred mezzo-sopranos Joyce DiDonato and Frederica von Stade, soprano Ailyn Pérez, baritone Nathan Gunn and countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo.

Heggie's 2016 operatic adaptation of the 1946 film It's a Wonderful Life was commissioned by Houston Grand Opera with a libretto by Gene Scheer.

Based on Philip Van Doren Stern's story "The Greatest Gift" and made famous by the 1946 Frank Capra film, the opera follows the journey of George Bailey, a troubled banker about to end his own life on Christmas Eve only to be saved when his guardian angel helps him realize how many lives he has touched.

Auden, Charlene Baldridge, Mark Campbell, Raymond Carver, Hart Crane, Gavin Geoffrey Dillard, Emily Dickinson, Charles Hart, John Hall, A. E. Housman, Galway Kinnell, Sister Helen Prejean, Vachal Lindsay, Phillip Littell, Amy Lowell, Armistead Maupin, Terrence McNally, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Laura Morefield, John Jacob Niles, Dorothy Parker, Rainer Maria Rilke, Gini Savage, Ann Sexton, Gene Scheer, Frederica von Stade, Pamela Stewart, Sir Philip Sidney, Judyth Walker, and Walt Whitman, among others.

In 2002, Heggie was commissioned by the Oakland East Bay Symphony to compose Holy the Firm: an essay for cello and orchestra for cellist Emil Miland.

These collaborators include: Heggie has also written for Broadway stars Patti LuPone (for whom he wrote To Hell And Back) and Audra McDonald (his song Vanity (blah blah me) was part of a song cycle commissioned by Carnegie Hall for McDonald titled The Seven Deadly Sins, which also features compositions by Michael John LaChiusa, Stephen Flaherty, Ricky Ian Gordon and others).

Stage directors who have championed his work include Leonard Foglia, Joe Mantello, Tomer Zvulun and Jack O'Brien.