Artists

Jenny Kallick has created two original music dramas prior to ARCHITECT: WinterReise (based on Schubert's song cycle) in 2001 for soprano, baritone, string trio, and piano with director Jeffrey Lentz; and The Death of Victor Hartmann (Incorporating songs and piano music of Musorgsky) in 2003 for bass, violin, clarinet, and cello with director and designer John Conklin.

Patricia Julien writes extensively for theatrical productions, including composing the score for O, Caligula! A Mvsical. In the last ten years, she has composed the music for productions of India Song, Ostentatious Poverty, Eurydice, The Clean House, Peter Pan, The Arabian Nights, The Witches, Anna’s Journal, Winnie The Pooh, Marat/Sade, and Coracles, Castanets, Cadaques.

As a prize-winner in scholastic (Dora Khyatt); Collegiate (Bi-Co Concerto Competition); national (Seattle International Virtuoso Artists Festival); and international (Quebec International Music Competition) piano adjudications, Bruce Leto’s music tenure has enabled him to perform in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Florida, New York, and Italy. During his collegiate years, Leto received 1st Prize in the Bi-College Student Concerto Competition and performed the 3rd Movement of Gershwin’s Concerto in F with the Haverford/Bryn Mawr Orchestra.

Thomas Mann graduated with a B.A. in Music at Texas State University with a focus on piano and composition and completed his Master of Music in Composition in December, 2018. Mann is currently Director of Orchestras and Classical Guitar Ensembles as well as the Fine Arts Department Chair at W. Charles Akins High School in the Austin Independent School District of Texas. Mann is a board member of The National Association of Composers, USA-Texas Chapter as well as an active member of several other organizations and associations. He plays Piano, Hammond Organ, Rhodes, Guitar, and Bass in several genres and with various artists around Texas. Along with teaching and live performances, he does studio work, arranging and composing for pop, jazz, and modern works.

Diane Jones’ music has been performed by The Relâche Ensemble, The Da Capo Chamber Players, Trio Casals, and Flautet. She has been commissioned by Mélomanie, the Society for New Music, and the Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, and she recently completed a commission from the Syracuse International Film Festival to score the 1919 silent film, “The Doll,” screened during the 2019 festival with a live ensemble.

A bright, young, accomplished singer on the opera and concert stages, soprano Katherine Jolly has appeared in leading roles with Opera Theatre Saint Louis, Florida Grand Opera, New York City Opera, Virginia Opera, Amarillo Opera, Piedmont Opera, Lyric Opera Cleveland, American Lyric Theatre, and Union Avenue Opera. In the concert arena she has performed in multiple seasons with Bach Society Saint Louis in Bach’s Coffee Cantata, The Kingsbury Ensemble in Bach’s Wedding Cantata and Handel’s Il Delirio Amoroso, as the soprano soloist in Handel’s The Messiah with the Evansville Philharmonic, the Richmond Symphony, and the Phoenix Symphony.

Jennifer Jolley (b. 1981) is a West Texas-based composer of vocal, orchestral, wind ensemble, chamber, and electronic works.

Fergus Johnston (b. 1959) is an Irish-born composer. He graduated from Trinity College Dublin with an Honors degree in Music in 1982. In 1999 he completed a Master's degree in Music and Media Technology at TCD (1999), and in 2011 he received a Ph.D. from the National University of Ireland, Maynooth. As a result of his contribution to Irish culture, he was elected to membership of Aosdána, Ireland's state-supported artistic academy, in 1992, and was a board member of the National Concert Hall, Dublin from 1996 until 2001.

Jitro, meaning “Daybreak” in Czech, is more than just a concert choir from Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic. It is an organization of 400 children in seven preparatory ensembles, of which only the best 25 or 30 qualify to tour. For the past 45 years they have been admired all over the world for their tonal brilliance, superb intonation, distinctively rich blend of sound, and energetic vitality. Today, Jitro is considered one of the best children’s choirs in the world.

Since 1989, Jan Jirásek’s works have been presented on numerous stages and festivals worldwide. Jirásek composes music for major music houses and interpreters. Examples include his Bread and Circuses composition for six players on percussion instruments (Munich Biennale, 1992), a postmodern arrangement of J.S. Bach’s St. Luke Passion (Munich Biennale, 1996, Minneapolis MN, 2000), Dance with the Universe concert for the organ and orchestra (Portland Chamber Orchestra, 2012), Missa propria choral composition (Prague, Spring 1994 and 2014, Carnegie Hall, New York, Lincoln Center, New York, Avignon Festival, France etc.), Fragile Balance/Letter to Heaven (Vega String Quartet, Atlanta GA, 2012), King Lávra (micro-opera, Khorikos New York NY, 2013), and other works.

American composer and pianist Christopher Jessup is an award-winning artist of formidable prowess. Jessup has garnered international acclaim, with critics praising his “imaginative handling of atmosphere” [Fanfare Magazine] and “high standard of technique” [New York Concert Review]. Furthermore, he has performed at Carnegie Hall countless times, soloed with distinguished orchestras across the globe, and collaborated with some of the finest artists and ensembles of our time.

Ryan Jesperson is a composer whose music is steeped in the modern practice of blurring genres and skewing expectations. Ryan holds degrees from Washington State University and The Hartt School and earned his doctorate from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, where he was a Chancellor’s Doctoral Fellow and recipient of the 2011 Outstanding Dissertation Award.

Jennifer Bouton has performed around the world as a guest artist, clinician, and orchestral musician. A member of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra since 2011, she performed two seasons with Lyric Opera of Chicago, and has played guest roles with the Chicago Symphony and Detroit Symphony Orchestras, among others. In 2019 she won an extended appointment with the Australian Ballet and Australian Opera in Melbourne, and was invited to become a permanent member of Orchestra Victoria.

Barbara Jazwinski’s music has been heard throughout North America, Europe, and the Far East. Her portfolio, influenced by her Polish heritage and by the culture of New Orleans, her home for many years, includes over 100 original compositions in various genres and for many different vocal and instrumental ensembles. She has been commissioned by many artists and ensembles around the world and her works have been presented to critical acclaim at well-known concert series and international festivals. Among her numerous awards are the Prince Pierre of Monaco Composition Award and the First Prize in the Nicola De Lorenzo Composition Contest. Barbara Jazwinski’s compositions are available on several recording labels and on websites and radio stations around the world.

Composer Jan Järvlepp creates a genuine European/American musical fusion by combining the excitement of rock and jazz rhythms with the large-scale classical structures found in orchestral and chamber music. The seriousness of his well-thought-out forms and the immediacy of contemporary rhythmic and melodic ideas make a potent brew that is appealing to both open-minded classical listeners and pop music listeners who are searching for something new.

Storytelling is an important aspect in much of the music of American composer Christine Jancarz. Her recognizable melodies and rhythms are similar to the main characters of a novel, and along with aspects such as orchestration attempt to convey a narrative. Recurring melodies and rhythms are easily identifiable; like characters in a book, they become familiar. Much of her music is influenced by rock, jazz, and classical styles. She also frequently uses counterpoint, and mathematical concepts in her works, such as her Melodic Matrix series for solo instruments.

David Jaeger is a music producer, composer, and broadcaster. Jaeger's compositions range from chamber music to vocal and choral works and opera, as well as orchestral and electronic music. His works for the piano form a large portion of his canon, most of it added since his retirement from CBC in 2013. Since that date, Jaeger has concentrated increasingly on compositions for solo instruments and voices, often based on literary texts. His Nocturnes, written between 2020 and 2023, are all based on poetry he compiled from several authors who he has collaborated with: David Cameron, Seán Haldane, Bruce Whiteman, and his pianist collaborator, Christina Petrowska Quilico.

Composer Mark Eliot Jacobs, born in 1960, lives in southern Oregonís Rogue River Valley. He is a frequent participant in the musical life of the valley: principal trombonist in the Rogue Valley Symphony, and musician with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, among other engagements. He is an adjunct instructor at Southern Oregon University where he has taught in the areas of music theory, composition, and low brass. Mark holds the degree Doctor of Music from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois in Music Composition (1986).

In August 2020, Jeffrey Jacob was named Composer-in-Residence with the Philadelphia Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra. He has written six symphonies, three piano concertos, three string quartets, and numerous works for piano and chamber ensemble. Raymond Leppard and the Indianapolis Symphony premiered his Symphony: Winter Lightning. The London Symphony recorded his Symphony No. 3. The Moscow and St. Petersburg Symphonies premiered respectively his Piano Concertos 1 and 2 with the composer as soloist. The Gregg Smith Singers premiered his Sleeping At Last for mixed chorus and solo cello. Jacob’s Persistence of Memory was premiered by the Cleveland Chamber Symphony at the 1999 College Music Society National Convention and was selected by the Charles Ives Center for American Music for a performance by the Charleston Symphony at the 2002 Spoleto Festival.

Heidi Jacob’s music has been described by BBC Magazine as “compositions ...of complex mesmerizing beauty,” by David Patrick Stearns of the Philadelphia Inquirer as “a musical adventurer,” and by Gramophone Magazine as music with “.....forthright expressiveness [that] exposes a multitude of stylistic associations.” A composer, cellist, and conductor, she is a graduate of both the Curtis Institute of Music and The Juilliard School, with a D.M.A. in composition from Temple University. She has performed as a cellist throughout the United States and Europe and has recorded as a cellist and conductor for the Capstone Records, Albany Records, and Navona Records.