Fred Hersch
b. 1955
American
Summary
Fred Hersh has been active in the jazz world since 1978. He has recorded over 35 albums as a leader/duo partner and performed on over 100 albums. He has received five GRAMMY® nominations, four as jazz pianist and one as composer. He was honored by the Jazz Journatlist Association in 2011 as the Jazz Pianist of the Year. He has received grants from the NEA, Chamber Music America, the Rockefeller Foundation, Meet the Composer and a 2003 Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship in Composition.. He has had seven composition residencies at The MacDowell Colony. More than 100 of his compositions have been recorded by eminent jazz and classical artists.
Biography
Fred Hersh has been active in the jazz world since 1978. He has recorded over 35 albums as a leader/duo partner and performed on over 100 albums. He has received five GRAMMY® nominations, four as jazz pianist and one as composer. He was honored by the Jazz Journatlist Association in 2011 as the Jazz Pianist of the Year. He has received grants from the NEA, Chamber Music America, the Rockefeller Foundation, Meet the Composer and a 2003 Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship in Composition.. He has had seven composition residencies at The MacDowell Colony. More than 100 of his compositions have been recorded by eminent jazz and classical artists.
Fred's first fully notated "classical" composition, 24 VARIATIONS ON A BACH CHORALE for piano, was published by C.F. Peters Corporation in 2003. Peters has gone on to publish several more of his piano volumes as well as works for piano trio, marimba solo, and chorus. He has most recently composed a work for Igor Levit which he has been performing at recitals around the world.
Fred is currently on the Jazz Studies faculty, at the New England Conservatory and at Rutgers University.