Jack Gallagher

JACK GALLAGHER is the Olive Williams Kettering Professor of Music at The College of Wooster (Ohio). He holds doctoral and master’s degrees in composition from Cornell University and the bachelor’s degree cum laude from Hofstra University. He studied composition with Elie Siegmeister, Robert Palmer and Burrill Phillips, participated in seminars with Karel Husa, Thea Musgrave and Ned Rorem, and in masterclasses with Aaron Copland, George Crumb and William Bolcom.

His Naxos CD of orchestral music, recorded by the London Symphony under the direction of JoAnn Falletta at Abbey Road Studios, has been acclaimed by Gramophone as “fresh and exuberant,” noting “The LSO couldn’t sound finer; it’s as if the music had been specifically written to showcase their approach to making sound.” Awarded five stars by BBC Music Magazine, the disc was heralded by National Public Radio, which found his music “brilliantly orchestrated and impeccably constructed.” The recording also was awarded five stars by Audiophile Audition, which called his Symphony in One Movement: Threnody “truly a work of genius” and added, “If you buy only one disc of new music this year, I would certainly suggest this as the place to begin.”

Gallagher’s works have been performed or recorded by the London Symphony, Virginia Symphony, Charleston Symphony, Cleveland Chamber Symphony, Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra of Krakow, Kiev Philharmonic, Koszalin Philharmonic Orchestra, Ruse Philharmonic Orchestra (Bulgaria), Utah Arts Festival Orchestra, U.S. Air Force Band of Flight, Cincinnati Conservatory Wind Ensemble, Indiana University Wind Ensemble, Grammy® award-winning pianist Angelin Chang, Trio Terzetto, and others. His compositions are included on fourteen published compact discs on the Naxos, Musical Heritage Society, Capstone, Vienna Modern Masters, Summit Records, Promuse, Altissimo, and ERM labels.

Gallagher’s music has been broadcast over WGBH (Boston), KUSC (Los Angeles), KDFC (San Francisco), WFMT (Chicago), WCLV (Cleveland), WQXR (New York), WQED (Pittsburgh), WKCP (Miami), KING (Seattle), KUHA (Houston), WETA (Washington, D.C.), KHPR (Honolulu), KWUR (St. Louis), WGUC (Cincinnati), WKCP (Miami), Minnesota Public Radio, KPAC (San Antonio), KBPS (Portland, OR), KVOD (Denver), Classical 24, Radio New Zealand, and many other stations. His Berceuse, recorded by the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra of Krakow conducted by Szymon Kawalla, has been broadcast more than 50 times over Radio Stephansdom Klassiksender, 107.3 FM, Vienna, Austria and more than 85 times over KUNC 91.5 FM in Colorado.

He has been the recipient of awards, grants, fellowships, or recognition from the Ohio Arts Council, the Charles Ives Center for American Music, Meet the Composer, the Yaddo Corporation, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, The Petit Jean International Art Song Festival, the Barlow International Composition Contest, the Virginia chapter of the College Band Directors National Association, and The College of Wooster Henry Luce III Award for Distinguished Scholarship. As a producer, his recording for TNC Records of Messiaen’s Oiseaux exotiques with pianist Angelin Chang, conductor John McLaughlin Williams and the Cleveland Chamber Symphony (TNC CD 1515) won a 2007 GRAMMY® Award in the classical category “Best Instrumental Soloist Performance with Orchestra.”

At Wooster he teaches Composition, Twentieth-Century Music Theory, Orchestration, and Seminar in Music of Living Composers, a course he originated.