John Aylward
Assistant Professor, Music Composition and Theory
Clark University
Worcester, MA 01610-1477
E-mail: jaylward@clarku.edu
Phone: 508-793-7335
Office: Estabrook Hall
John Aylward has been awarded a Goddard Lieberson Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Radcliffe Institute Fellowship from Harvard University, a Fulbright Grant to Germany and First Prize from the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM). He has also been awarded fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, Tanglewood, the Aspen Music School, the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Aylward’s work has been praised for its rhythmic vitality and rigorous formal qualities. Aylward’s music has been performed within the U.S and abroad by numerous leading ensembles and soloists.
Aylward’s writings on contemporary music can be read in Perspectives of New Music and the Mitteilungen Der Paul Sacher Stiftung. As a pianist, Aylward regularly performs contemporary music worldwide. Recent concert dates include Harvard’s Paine Hall, The Collis Center at Dartmouth, The American Composers Forum in Washington, DC, the University of Campinas in Sao Paulo, and Distler Hall at Tufts University.
In 2005, John began a group for contemporary music: the East Coast Contemporary Ensemble. In 2009, the group became a not-for-profit 501(c)3 dedicated to presenting the most adventuresome new music worldwide. One of Aylward’s first initiatives for the group was to establish an international music festival. The Etchings Festival, now in its 3rd season, has attracted professional and student musicians from across the US and abroad and has already premiered numerous new works of contemporary music. The festival is a partnership with the Virginia Center for Creative Arts and is held at their artist space in Auvillar, France. The festival has attracted acclaim for its masterclasses and lessons, taught by luminary composers David Rakowski, Fabien Levy and Louis Karchin, Stefano Gervasoni and Lee Hyla.
Aylward is currently Assistant Professor of Music Composition and Theory at Clark University in Massachusetts. Aylward has also taught at Tufts University and at Brandeis University. John lives in Boston, Massachusetts and is originally from Tucson, Arizona.