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Bevan Manson

composer and jazz pianist in Los Angeles

About Me

Los Angeles composer and jazz pianist Bevan Manson lives in many worlds, balancing them without seemingly �crossing-over.� He is a jazz pianist, an active classical composer, an arranger and producer for many jazz vocalists; a composer of over 100 jazz tunes and the scores for several independent films. His work in the L.A. studios includes frequent on-camera appearances as a jazz pianist in TV and film.

Bevan has worked with Darol Anger, Ron Jones' L.A. Big Band, Gunther Schuller, Suzanne Pittson, Howard McGhee, George Garzone, Jerry Bergonzi, Paul McCandless, Cecil McBee, and Bob Sheppard. He has recorded for the Iris, Flying Fish, and Challenge labels, and has been featured at the Montreux, North Sea, San Francisco, Boston, and Tirano jazz festivals.

His music has been noted for its harmonic subtlety and innovative rhythms. Bevan's “Quartet for Violin, Viola, Cello, and Piano” was recently performed by the resident ensemble ArcoVoce at the Phillips Collection in Washington D.C.. The Washington Post called the work “powerfully polyrhythmic”. The American Music Center awarded Bevan a CAP grant for this composition in 2008.

Other recent performances of his music include; “Irony Untold” performed by members of the San Francisco Symphony at the Stern Grove Festival, and ”Hotel Viola,” which had its first performance at the 2008 International Viola Congress by the Southern California Viola Choir.

He has been commissioned to write music recently for Sierra Chamber Music, and L.A. Chamber Orchestra associate principal violist Victoria Miskolczy. Formerly Director of UC Jazz at Cal Berkeley, Bevan also served on the faculty of the New England Conservatory for ten years, taught at Berklee College and the Thelonious Monk Institute, and is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music.

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