James Grant,DMA
Composer-in-Residence, Bay-Atlantic Symphony, 1999-2002Composer-in-Residence, Institute for the Environment Through the Arts, 1996-98
Composer-in-Residence, Fairfax Symphony Orchestra, 1993-96
Assistant Professor of Music, Middlebury College, 1988-92
For over twenty years, James Grant (b. 1954) has been commissioned by individuals, choruses, chamber groups and orchestras. His works have been performed in the United States, Australia, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, the Czech Republic, England, Japan, and New Zealand. As a composer of choral music, he has taken First Prize honors in three international competitions; and his orchestral overture CHART won first prize in the 1998 Indiana State University / Louisville Orchestra competition for new orchestral music.
After completing the DMA degree in composition from Cornell University, Grant was Assistant Professor of Music at Middlebury College in Vermont between 1988-1992, where he taught composition, coordinated an American Music Week Festival each year, and directed the New Music From Middlebury concert series. In 1992, Grant left academe to compose and lecture full-time and from 1993-96 served as Composer-In-Residence to the Fairfax Symphony Orchestra in Fairfax, Virginia. From 1996-98, he served as Composer-In-Residence to the Institute for the Environment Through the Arts, a nonprofit organization that brings together presenters, funding sources, artists of all disciplines, and environmental leaders to promote environmental awareness in communities through artistic expression. Presently, Grant is serving three years as Composer-In-Residence to the Bay-Atlantic Symphony in Bridgeton, New Jersey. Recognized by Cornell University's Graduate School of Humanities and Arts and by the Vermont chapter of the National Music Teachers Association for exceptional contributions as an educator, Grant continues to be active as a lecturer and private teacher of composition.
Grant's colorful musical language is known by musicians and audiences for its honed craft and immediacy. His ability to compose music appropriate to specific levels of experience has found him working with groups ranging from beginning youth orchestras, to community choruses, to professional contemporary chamber ensembles, ballet companies and orchestras.
In recent seasons, Grant's orchestral music has been featured on programs by the Louisville Orchestra, Minneapolis Pops Orchestra, Muncie Symphony Orchestra, Fairfax Symphony Orchestra, Central Florida Symphony Orchestra, Bay-Atlantic Symphony, San Jose Chamber Orchestra, Kansas City Chamber Orchestra, Hopkins Symphony Orchestra, Missouri Chamber Orchestra, Lawrence Chamber Orchestra, and a number of youth orchestras, including the Vermont Youth Orchestra and the Etowah Youth Symphony Orchestra. In the spring of 2000, two works were premiered at the International Tuba/Euphonium Conference in Saskatchewan. Current chamber and orchestral commissions take him through the year 2002, including: Symphonic Poem No. 1: Release for the Hopkins Symphony Orchestra and Bay-Atlantic Symphony Orchestra, based on the platinum photography of Elizabeth Siegfried; a work for saxophone quartet and orchestra, for the Capitol Quartet; and a large-scale work for chorus and orchestra for the Choral Arts Society of Washington. Grant lives and works in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.
James Grant's published music and recordings are available exclusively online, at JamesGrantMusic.com.