Composer, saxophonist, and theorist Benjamin Boone, a U.S. Fulbright Scholar to the Ireland (2022-23), Ghana (2017-18) and the Republic
of Moldova (2005), is a Full Professor of Music at Fresno State, where he has taught
since 2000. Boone has received the university’s highest honors, including the President’s Award
of Excellence, the Provost’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, the Provost’s Award
for Outstanding Achievement in Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity, and the
Spirit of Service Award. In addition to teaching in the music theory and composition
areas, Boone serves as Faculty Service-Learning Scholar for Fresno State's Richter
Center for Community Engagement and Service-Learning.
Boone’s Origin Records release with the late U.S. Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize
recipient Philip Levine, The Poetry of Jazz, was hailed as “an album of unmistakable… historic importance” (UK Vibe), featured on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,” voted #3 “Best Album of 2018” in DownBeat Magazine, a Staff Pick in The Paris Review, and on Amazon’s “Hot New Releases” list for months.
His latest release, The Poets are Gathering (2020 Origin Records), featuring U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, Pulitzer
Prize recipient Tyehimba Jess, and nine other poets -- alongside jazz greats Kenny
Werner, Ari Hoenig, and Ben Monder -- has been described as “an absolute must – a vector for the reflection of injustice” (Belgium’s Jazz Halo), “worthy of praise” (Black Grooves), and “intense and hard-hitting…socially and politically conscious…Boone’s vision
surpasses all expectations…Best so far in 2020” (Stephen Graham, Founder of UK’s JazzWise Magazine). All About Jazz writes: “The union of poetry and jazz has never been so powerfully presented…perhaps
best defines the iconic year of 2020.”
Boone was awarded #3 “Best Alto Saxophonist of 2020” in the 42nd Annual JazzStation Awards, and his album with The Ghana Jazz Collective, Joy, was named #5 “Best Album of 2020” and #5 “Best Instrumental Group of 2020.” A #1
“Hot New Release” on Amazon, reviews include: “so hot they leave smoke trails...genuine cross-cultural jazz…dexterous and powerful...magnificent” (All About Jazz); “A superb new album…one of the best releases so far this year!” (London’s JazzFM); and “[Boone is] an artist of the first order…his music is never
facile…some of the finest you will have the pleasure of listening to in a very long
time” (JazzDaGama).
Boone’s contemporary classical compositions have been performed in 35 countries, appear
on 28 recordings, and have been the subject of several National Public Radio and Bayerischer
Rundfunk (German Radio) stories. The past several years, Boone has focused on writing
music that addresses relevant cultural and environmental issues. His ethno-historical
opera Ascencion, about Native American cultural genocide, was featured on NPR’s “Weekend Edition Saturday,” and his orchestral work, Waterless Music: A Drought Symphony, which premiered in 2015 at Los Angeles’ Disney Hall, was featured on NPR’s “Here
and Now.” Boone’s contemporary classical compositions have garnered eighteen honors
and awards from organizations such as the International Society of Contemporary Music,
the Olympia International Prize for Composition, Billboard Magazine, the National Association of Composers, New Music USA, The American Music Center,
and American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers.
