Jan Jarczyk

Department of Performance (Schulich School of Music)

PIANIST AND COMPOSER

Jan Jarczyk, polish- born pianist, composer, lives in North America-USA and Canadasince 1977. While in Boston. Mass. he worked with a lot of Boston-based musicians and taught harmony and composition from 1980 to 1985 at Berklee College of Music.

Over the years he has written a lot of music for various size ensembles, from solo pieces to full-size symphony orchestra, the likes of which have been performed in Boston, Washington (DC), Chicago, Minneapolis, Montreal, Mainz (Germany), London, Bruxelles, Rome and Poland. Since 1985 he has recorded 7 CDs in Montreal as pianist, leader and composer-arranger. One of them, Things to look for, received a nomination for a Felix Award in 1996. Mr. Jarczyk has composed music for The Polish Jazz Studio Orchestra, Polish TV and Radio, theaters and films. Recipient of the Polish Composers Society Annual Scholarship in 1969-71, Mr. Jarczyk also won the Grand Prix of the Concours d’improvisation de piano jazz in Lyon, France in 1974 and the SOCAN award for Best Jazz Composition during the Montreal Jazz Festival in 1999, Mr.Jarczyk is dividing his time between composing, performing and attending to his teaching duties as Professor at McGill University Schulich School of Music.

Jan Jarczyk has performed and recorded in Poland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, France, Benelux, Scandinavia, the USA, Japan, Spain, Kuwait and Canada as a leader and as a sideman with such prominent musicians as Zbiggy Seifert, Tomasz Stanko, Zbigniew Namyslowski, Leszek Zadlo, Janusz Stefanski, Phil Wilson, Greg Hopkins, Tim Hagans, Donny McCaslin, Aaron Scott, Pat LaBarbera, Jan De Haas, Jean-Pierre Zanella, Michel Donato, Kevin Dean, Neil Sveinson, Andre White, Dave Laing, Remi Bolduc, and Charito among many others.