Edward Jacobs

Edward Jacobs

Edward Jacobs teaches at East Carolina University, where his activities have also included the founding and direction of the North Carolina NewMusic Initiative (formerly the NewMusic@ECU Festival) begun in March, 2001.Jacobs began playing violin at age 8, but abandoned that at age 11--upon hearing a friend's jazz quartet--in favor of the saxophone. Work at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (B.A., 1984) in jazz performance and arranging (Jeff Holmes) and composition (Salvatore Macchia, Robert Stern) was followed by study in composition (Andrew Imbrie, Olly Wilson, Gerard Grisey) and conducting (Michael Senturia) at the University of California, Berkeley (M.A., 1986) and at Columbia University (composition with Mario Davidovsky, Chou Wen-Chung, Marty Boykan, George Edwards) where he completed the D.M.A. in 1993.In 2005 Jacobs' work as a composer of both instrumental/vocal and electronic was recognized by a Charles Ives Award of the American Academy of Arts & Letters.  The Academy's citation reads "Edward Jacobs's music masters the 'virtual' and 'real' sound habitats and embeds them into a unified and consistent single space with grace, broad orchestral imagination and expressivity.  Jacobs's music is immediately engaging, attractive and intellectually demanding."Bio courtesy of his website.

Dissertation
"The Fiction of a Glance" for orchestra. (Original composition)
Columbia Degrees: 
DMA, Composition
1994