A pianist who “can create whatever type of music he wants at the keyboard” (Chicago Sun-Times) and a composer who writes “with uncommon imagination” (Atlanta Journal-Constitution), James Adler combines his talents with Allegro Scherzando: A Celebration for concert band and piano. Mr. Adler composed this work for the 30th anniversary of the Lesbian & Gay Big Apple Corps Symphonic Band (Brian P. Worsdale, Artistic Director) and is their soloist in November for the world premiere at Peter Norton Symphony Space in New York City. The season also sees premieres in September of “Disciples for The Lord,” commissioned by the Western Hills United Methodist Church in Fort Worth, and “Reverie, Interrupted” for tenor saxophone and piano which Mr. Adler and Jordan P. Smith debut at the Manhattan School of Music in February.
Mr. Adler also appears this season as soloist in the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2, in a special transcription for concert band and piano, at performances in Manhattan and Brooklyn. The season concludes with an appearance at the annual Memorial Day Concert at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, NY, where he performs Gottschalk's Célèbre Tarentelle with the ISO Concert Band, and the Gottschalk solo work Pasquinade.
James Adler’s CD, “James Adler Plays Syncopated Rhythms” was released in April 2008 by Albany Records. “It is a virtuosic affair, brilliantly played... The centerpiece is the stunning transcription of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue (complete, including all the cadenzas)” (Turok’s Choice, September 2008) -- a piece he has performed extensively, including for an audience of 50,000 at Chicago’s Grant Park Concerts, and from New York’s Paramount Theatre, to the Dimitria Festival in Thessoloniki Greece, to the French Woods Festival of the Performing Arts in New York (making his fifth appearance in July 2009).
Mr. Adler’s extensive list of compositions is headed by Memento mori: An AIDS Requiem. The work premiered in Atlanta in 1996 and has been performed from New York City (Johannes Somary, conducting) to Tallinn, Estonia (under the baton of Ants Soots) to San Francisco (directed by Grammy-award winner Joseph Jennings). Memento mori features a “range of expression [that] is expansive” and is “a unique, well-crafted, emotionally rich piece” (American Record Guide). Four octavos from Memento mori are available through Subito Music; the entire work is represented by European American Music.
Audiophiles can enjoy Mr. Adler’s music on the premiere recording of Memento mori by the AmorArtis Chorale and Orchestra under the direction of Mr. Somary. Following the West Coast premiere, this disc (released worldwide by Albany Records) was the #1 uniquely selling CD in San Francisco on amazon.com. Other recordings of his music include Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano Victoria Livengood, a soloist on the Albany recording, presenting the requiem’s Pie Jesu on her disc “We Gather Together.” Nicholas Underhill’s CD “Light and Sirius” features Mr. Adler’s 3 Piano Transitions, which Gramophone (January 2008) noted “spins appealing variations on the venerable forms of passacaglia, prelude and toccata before immersing itself in spicy and ebullient Caribbean-influenced dances.”
Other compositions by Mr. Adler include Reflections upon a September morn with poetry by Walt Whitman; On the Rebound, premiered by the Gregg Smith Singers; the often-performed Carols of Splendour, which premiered at Carnegie Hall; It’s Gotta Be America, commissioned and performed for the Centennial Celebration of the Statue of Liberty; and Canticle For Peace, written and performed for the opening of the 43rd session of the United Nations General Assembly. Mr. Adler is the composer of Concerto in G for Piano and Orchestra, the children’s “pOpera” Herbie and Carnie: A Dinosaga, the Classic Rag-time Suite for orchestra, numerous solo, chamber, and choral works, and the award-winning film score for The Hat Act.>
Mr. Adler made his orchestral performing debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and has appeared in recital on the Orchestra’s Allied Arts Piano Series. Other highlights include appearances on the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts Series at the Chicago Cultural Center; featured soloist performances at Alice Tully Hall; and a special London orchestral performance at the Royal Albert Hall, broadcast by the BBC.
A native of Chicago, James Adler is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. A member of the Fine Arts Department faculty at Saint Peter’s College (where he has also served as choral director), he has adjudicated at national and international music competitions and is the recipient of an award from ASCAP for outstanding composition achievement each year since 1978. He has received grants from Meet The Composer and from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, and he is a laureate in Who’s Who in American Music and the International Who’s Who in Music.
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Last Update: June 2010
ISO Memorial Day Concert
James Adler addressing the crowd at the annual Memorial Day Concert of The ISO Concert Band in Brooklyn, NY. Mr. Adler joined the band for Gottschalk's Célèbre Tarentelle and the Gottschalk Pasquinade.