Bob Brookmeyer Conducts NEC Jazz Composers Orchestra

Bob Brookmeyer conducts the 18-player New England Conservatory Jazz Composers' Orchestra in works by NEC composers and arrangers, December 13 at 8 p.m. in NEC's Brown Hall. Composer, arranger, trombonist, pianist, and director of the Orchestra, Brookmeyer was named a 2006 Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts in September. The award carries with it a $25,000 fellowship and invitations to participate in outreach efforts, broadcasts, and NEA Jazz Masters On Tour. Brookmeyer joins other present and past NEC faculty and alumni on the Jazz Masters list including George Russell and Cecil Taylor.

Born in Kansas City, MO in 1929, the jazz veteran studied composition at the Kansas City Conservatory of Music. Arriving in New York in 1952, he played with Claude Thornhill, Woody Herman, Teddy Charles, and Charles Mingus. In 1953, he joined Stan Getz, followed by stints with Gerry Mulligan, the Jimmy Giuffre Three and his own quintet with Clark Terry. Brookmeyer played and composed for the Thad Jones-Mel Lewis Orchestra beginning with its founding in 1965, and after ten years in California returned as musical director for Mel Lewis and the Jazz Orchestra.

Since 1981 he has been very active as composer, conductor, teacher, and performer in Europe, working in both classical and jazz idioms. His work as a composer has been recognized with a succession of NEA jazz composition grants. In 1994 he was appointed musical director of the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival Big Band, a worldwide jazz-based ensemble dedicated to new music. This ensemble served as the nucleus for Brookmeyer's New Art Orchestra, which began touring in 2001. With that band, Brookmeyer has made three CDs on the Challenge label, New Works which was CD of the year in England, Waltzing with Zo and Get Well Soon, which was nominated for a Grammy. Brookmeyer was commissioned by The 12 Cellists of the Berlin Philharmonic to write a piece for an EMI CD, featuring the German trumpet player, Till Broenner. He is currently at work on a concert length piece, Spirit Music, for the New Art Orchestra, to be recorded in January 2006.

The concert is free and open to the public.