Jesse Jones is a composer and multi-instrumentalist who moonlights as a luthier. His music lurks on the lines between folk, bluegrass, roots music, the classical tradition, and the European avant-guard. Described as “striking,…elegant and poised,” in the New York Times, “engaging,…eerie, and well-written” in the Los Angeles Times, “fascinating,” and possessed of “the melodic earthiness of Britten” (New York Classical Review), Jones’s numerous compositions are wide-ranging in style, instrumentation, and affect. His most recent pieces include solo and chamber works, and several full-length concertos: one for viola and orchestra, another for piano and sinfonietta, a third for guitar and microtonal ensemble, and a fourth for mandolin and mixed ensemble.
A professional, touring musician in the genre-hopping band EZRA, Jones is equally at home on mandolin-, guitar-, and banjo-family instruments, and also plays various keyboard instruments. He has even been known to sing on occasion.
Jones is featured as both a composer and instrumentalist on no fewer than 17 commercially-released albums, across 7 different labels, several of which are all-Jones compilations. He has appeared with orchestras, mandolin or banjo in hand, has been featured at numerous folk and bluegrass festivals across the states, and even played on the nationally-broadcast “A Prairie Home Companion With Garrison Keillor” in the early 2000’s.
When not composing or practicing, Jones is busy at work building instruments, both acoustic and electric. Currently on his workbench are hybrid acoustic guitars, plans for replicas of historical instruments, prototypes for microtonal mandolins, schema for multi-manual keyboard instruments with node-inducing stops and whammy bars, as well as drawings for simple microtonal flutes in 5- and 7-note equal temperament.
Jones currently resides with his family in Ohio, where he teaches at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music as Associate Professor of Composition. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, painting, and building furniture.