Jack Hughes is a Cleveland-based composer, music theorist, and educator and is a member of the music theory faculty at the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM). His “robust and convincing” (New York Times) piece Three Ways of Getting There was commissioned and premiered by the American Composers Orchestra in Carnegie Hall in November 2023.
The American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2020 named him a Charles Ives Scholar, and the Ecoles d’Art Americaines de Fontainebleau in 2018 awarded him the music theory prize for its famed course of study designed by Nadia Boulanger. The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival in 2021 commissioned him for its Young Composer String Quartet Project, for which he composed the work Jubilate PM. Jack served as composer fellow of San Francisco’s Volti choral ensemble and of the Canton Symphony Orchestra. His music has also been performed by eighth blackbird, Quatour Bozzini, the FLUX Quartet, and the Imani Winds.
Jack received his PhD in Music from the University of Chicago, where he studied composition with Augusta Read Thomas and Shulamit Ran and theory with Larry Zbikowski. He received his Bachelor of Music degree in composition and theory at CIM, in the studio of Keith Fitch. He began his musical studies on trumpet and piano in Reston, Virginia and also plays viola and traditional Irish fiddle.
Jack is a committed educator and enjoys giving seminars and lessons to students of all ages.