D. J. Sparr merges art-concert craft with influences from music he performed as a young guitarist. For the performance of Sparr’s BMI/Boudleax Bryant Fund Commission for Eighth Blackbird, the Albuquerque Tribune wrote: “… in the sextet's piece ‘The Glam Seduction,’ the 1980s rock music of Eddie Van Halen meets the instrumentation of Niccolo Paganini. ... The result: Paganini on coke.” The New York Times says “The curtain raiser was D. J. Sparr’s DACCA:DECCA:GaFfA, a bright, cheerfully tonal piece in which attractive melodies are shared among bells, and a pair of antiphonally placed steel-string acoustic guitars dance around a bed of languid string chords. This pop-inflected piece might have seemed out of place in an orchestral program a decade ago, but it suits the boundary-erasing spirit of today’s new-music world.”

D. J. has been named the next Young American Composer-in-Residence with the California Symphony where he will write new orchestral works over a two year period. He will also be involved in educational programs in the schools and community at large, visiting local schools to discuss the ideas and changes surrounding the commissions and to work with composition students.

Sparr’s music has been commissioned and performed by groups such as the Albany Symphony, the Berkshire Symphony, Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Band, the League of Composers’ Orchestra, the Los Angeles “Debut” Orchestra, New Music Detroit, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the University of Washington, the Verge Ensemble, Wet Ink and Yale University. His recent work “Precious Metal: A Concerto for Flute and Winds” was commissioned by a consortium of thirty-three colleges led by the University of Washington and was featured on their 2010 tour of Japan.

Premieres for 2010-11 include the Dayton Philharmonic, the Williamsburg Symphonia, Eighth Blackbird and the Amsterdam-based Hexnut Ensemble.

D. J. was awarded the $10,000 grand prize in the orchestra category of the BMG/Williams College National Young Composers Competition and was an alternate for the 1998-99 Rome Prize. He received BMI Student Composer Awards in 1995 and 2000 and has received awards and recognition from the American Music Center, the Composers’ Guild, Eastman School of Music, George Washington University, New York Youth Symphony and the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble.

An accomplished guitarist, Sparr performs in numerous solo and chamber engagements. He premiered Michael Daugherty’s electric guitar concerto “Gee’s Bend” with the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini in Italy in March 2010 and with the Alabama Symphony in March 2009, and will perform alongside Marin Alsop at the 2011 Cabrillo Festival of New Music. D. J. is a sponsored artist of JHS Guitars in Vantaa, Finland; his guitar is the JHS Rocktor (D. J. Sparr signature model).

D. J. is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music (BM) and the University of Michigan (MM, DMA). His principal teachers include Michael Daugherty, William Bolcom, Sydney Hodkinson, Christopher Rouse, Joseph Schwantner and Augusta Read Thomas. He studied with John Harbison at the Aspen Music Festival and the Oregon Bach Festival and was an Associate Artist-in-Residence under Aaron Jay Kernis at the Atlantic Center for the Arts.

Sparr is the composer-in-residence for the Richmond Symphony’s Education and Community Engagement Department (2010-11); and in the summers, he is a faculty member at the Walden School for Musicians. A native of Baltimore, Md., he lives in Richmond with his wife Kimberly and their two dogs, Lloyd and Nanette.