JACK JARRETT

Composer, Pianist, Conductor

Jack Jarrett is a native of Asheville, North Carolina. His academic credentials include a B.A. from the University of Florida; an M.A. from the Eastman School of Music; a Diploma in Conducting from the Berlin Hochschule für Musik; and a Doctor of Music in Composition from Indiana University. Major teachers have included Boris Blacher, Bernhard Heiden, Erich Peter, and Tibor Kozma. From 1989 to 1999 he was Chairman of the Composition Department at the Berklee College of Music. Currently he is Professor of Composition at the same institution. Previously he taught at Virginia Commonwealth University, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, the University of Richmond, and Dickinson College. He has been recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship, a Ford Foundation Composer-In-Residency, and an Aspen Conducting Fellowship.

Dr. Jarrett’s compositions are published by G. Schirmer, Lawson-Gould, Carl Fischer, Bourne, Tuba Press, and Warner Brothers, and include a four-movement Choral Symphony on American Poems. He has written in all major musical media, including three operas which have received full-scale performances. His works have been performed by a number of orchestras including the London Symphony Orchestra (recorded at Abbey Road), Czech Radio Orchestra (recorded in Prague), the Boston Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra, the Rochester Philharmonic, the M.I.T. Concert Band, the Eastern Music Festival Orchestra, the Greensboro Symphony, the Richmond Symphony, Cedar Rapids Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony, New Mexico Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, New Haven Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Illinois Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Florida Symphony, Oklahoma Sinfonia, Omaha Symphony, the Long Bay Symphony, the National Gallery Orchestra, and the National Musical Arts Ensemble.

He has held positions as Assistant Conductor of the Richmond Symphony, Musical Director of the Richmond Opera Company, and Principal Guest Conductor of the Western Plains Opera Company. In the field of musical comedy, he was Music Director for the New York City premiere of Louis Stewart’s Cambodia Agonistes, and for the Boston premiere of Domenic Testa’s The Hopeless Romantic. Recently he conducted the world premiere of his fusion work Pooja (Offering), for Carnatic Indian performers and Western chamber ensemble, at the new Getty Center in Los Angeles.

In addition to his musical activities, Dr. Jarrett is an accomplished computer programmer, having designed two commercially successful music printing software programs entitled Music Printer and Music Printer Plus. Currently he is involved in computer-generated Virtual Orchestra emulation. His book, Studies In Musical Composition is published by the Berklee Press.