Conservatory of Music Names Double Grammy Award-winning Arturo O'Farrill '96 Director of its Jazz Ensembles
Oct. 3, 2014
Arturo O'Farrill (Photo: Rebecca Meeks)
World-renowned, Grammy Award-winning pianist, composer, and band leader Arturo O'Farrill has joined the Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College as a full-time faculty member and director of its jazz ensembles, a position he has held on an interim basis for the past two years.
"The committee conducted an intensive nationwide search that produced a number of stellar candidates competing for the post," said Conservatory Chair Bruce MacIntyre. "We look forward to continuing to work with him to help us reinvigorate our work."
A founder of the nonprofit Afro Latin Jazz Alliance, O'Farrill was educated at the Manhattan School of Music, the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, and the Conservatory of Music of Brooklyn College. He was named a Brooklyn College Distinguished Alumnus in 2006.
"I had already travelled the world as a band leader when I came to Brooklyn College. I came because of the school's reputation and also to improve my piano playing techniques," said O'Farrill, who was born in Mexico and raised in New York City. "The faculty helped me improve my hand posture, among other things. It made all the difference in the world for my career."
The son of legendary Cuban composer Chico O'Farrill, who blended the bebop style with Afro-Cuban rhythms and shades of classical music, O'Farrill has performed with a wide spectrum of artists, including the Carla Bley Big Band, Dizzy Gillespie, Steve Turre, Freddy Cole, The Fort Apache Band, Lester Bowie, Wynton Marsalis, and Harry Belafonte.
In 2002, O'Farrill created the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra at Lincoln Center to bring the vital musical traditions of Afro Latin jazz to a wider general audience, and to expand the contemporary Latin jazz big band repertoire by commissioning jazz and Latin jazz artists across a wide stylistic and geographical range. He established the Afro Latin Jazz Alliance in 2007 as a new institutional support for his orchestra, and to promote that genre of music through a comprehensive array of performance and educational programs.
O'Farrill has received commissions from Meet the Composer, the Big Apple Circus, the Philadelphia Music Project, Symphony Space, and the Bronx Museum of the Arts. He has performed as a solo artist and with his smaller musical combos and recorded numerous CDs, three of which were Grammy nominees. Along with the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra he received the 2008 Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Album for Song for Chico, released by Zoho music. The title track, written by Cuban drummer Dafnis Prieto, was a tribute to O'Farrill's father. The orchestra was again nominated for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album in 2011 for 40 Acres and a Burro, also released by Zoho music. In November this year, O'Farrill won his second Latin Grammy for Final Night at Birdland, an album he recorded in 2011 with Chico O'Farrill's Afro Cuban Jazz Orchestra, celebrating their 15 years of residence at the famous Broadway club.
A Steinway Artist, he has taught at several institutions of higher education, including The Juilliard School, Queensborough Community College, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, The New School, SUNY-Purchase, and the Manhattan School of Music.
"I've been interested in finding a home in an educational institution for some time and, as luck would have it, I found it at my alma mater," O'Farrill said. "Teaching here gives me the opportunity to make an impact on educating new generations of musicians. That is worth more than all the touring in the world. How often do you get the opportunity to change the way music is understood and taught? It's something you can't get from the stage."
