Major Works
- The Shoe Bird (2002) musical album for children
- Violin Concerto (2015)
- A Christmas Memory (opera)
- Fanfare and Celebration (orchestral work)
- Elegy (orchestral work)
- Cello Conerto (2010)
- Concerto for Trombone and Orchestra (2009)
- Horn Concerto (2008)
- Tuba Concerto (2006)
Biography of Samuel Jones
Samuel Jones is a Mississippi-born composer, conductor, and music educator. He was born on June 2, 1935 in Inverness, Mississippi, and grew up there and in Jackson. He graduated from Jackson Central High School and then attended Millsaps College, in Jackson, Mississippi. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in composition from Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester.
He was conductor of several small American orchestras in his early career and then became the conductor of the Rochester Philharmonic. Jones founded The Shepherd School of Music at Rice University and served for six years as its first dean. He stepped down as dean after 6 years, but remained at Rice as a professor and Director of Graduate Students for 24 years. He retired in 1997. He is now living in the Seattle area where he is Composer in Residence of the Seattle Symphony.
Jones is the composer of The Shoe Bird, a work based on the fable by the famous author Eudora Welty is a work for children’s choir, orchestra, and narrator. This work was commissioned by the Mississippi Boys Choir and premiered at the University of Southern Mississippi, on March 21, 2002.
Samuel Jones has received many awards and prizes for his work including a Ford Foundation Recording/Publication Award, a Martha Baird Rockefeller Grant, several NEA grants and ASCAP awards, and Music Awards from the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters in 1986 and 1991. Such orchestras as the Philadelphia, Detroit, Houston, Cincinnati, the Rochester Philharmonic and scores of others, have performed his works. His music has been commissioned by, among others, the Houston Symphony, the American Symphony Orchestra League and the Amarillo Symphony.
His compositions include symphonies and other orchestral works, as well as works for chorus and orchestra, opera and chamber groups. His music is published by Carl Fischer, Inc., and Campanile Music Press.
Samuel Jones remains an important American composer and former conductor.