www.jbancks.com
Official website of composer Jacob Bancks

UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Please check back for my new website, to be launched Spring 2008.
You may contact me via email at jbancks (at) gmail (dot) com or by phone, (773) 401-5862.

BIO:

The music of Chicago-based composer Jacob Bancks has been described as “invitingly lyrical” and “colorfully orchestrated” (The New York Times). Recent commissions and performances have come from the Annapolis Symphony, the New York Youth Symphony, the South Dakota Symphony/Soli Deo Gloria, the Millennium Chamber Players, the International Double Reed Society, the Hanson Institute for American Music, and the Commission Project. His music has been performed by oboist Gordon Hunt, the Eastman Philharmonia, the Eastman Wind Ensemble, the Lute Song Project, OSSIA New Music, and many others. A 2008 recipient of a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, his other prizes include a BMI Student Composer Award, a Century Fellowship (University of Chicago), the Howard Hanson Orchestral Prize (Eastman), first prize in the Minnesota Music Teachers’ Association annual competition, a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and a nomination for the Lili Boulanger Memorial Prize. Upcoming projects include pieces for eighth blackbird, the Millennium Chamber Players, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

His teachers have included Shulamit Ran, Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon, and Augusta Read Thomas, and he has participated in masterclasses with Luca Francesconi and Louis Andreissen. Other important mentors have been Cliff Colnot, Daniel Paul Horn, and Ray and Sue Sidoti. He holds a Masters degree from Eastman School of Music, where he also studied piano with Vincent Lenti, and he is currently working toward a PhD at the University of Chicago, under a Jacob K. Javits Fellowship from the U.S. Department of Education. He was recently named 2008-09 composer-in-residence for the Millennium Chamber Players.

IF YOU ARE IN THE ANNAPOLIS/DC AREA, JOIN ME FOR:

Severn Voyages for orchestra
The Annapolis Symphony
Jose-Luís Novo, conductor
May 2-3, 2008, 8:00 PM
Maryland Hall for the Arts
Annapolis, MD
BUY TICKETS ($34-$44, students $10)