Aug. 30, 2010

CSU Monterey Bay lecturer John Wineglass is an award-winning composer and musician who has traveled the world since he was 11 years old.

He'll tell you he owes it all to an opportunity afforded him as a youngster growing up in Washington, D.C.

"Without question, the D.C. Youth Orchestra changed my life," Wineglass said.

Wineglass, who teaches classes in the university's Music and Performing Arts Department, traveled with the orchestra to Yugoslavia, Russia, China, Puerto Rico and Korea.

"The experience got me hooked on music and travel."

"Hooked" might be an understatement. It led him to earn a bachelor's degree in music composition at American University, and a master's degree in composition for motion pictures, television and multi-media at New York University.

So when the youth orchestra asked him to compose a piece for its 50th anniversary celebration at the Kennedy Center on Aug. 21, he seized the opportunity. Despite the short notice – he had only two months to work on the five-minute piece – he was eager to contribute to the program.

The concert featured an orchestra made up of alumni of the program, under the direction of National Symphony pops conductor Marvin Hamlisch and the youth orchestra's director, Jesus Manuel Berard.

A concert review in the Washington Post singled Wineglass out for praise.

According to the Post's music critic, Cecelia Porter, Berard "drew from the group iridescent colors in the premiere of a beautifully crafted suite by DCYO alumnus John Wineglass."

The composer was also the featured violinist for the piece, one of 110 alumni orchestra members who performed that night.

"Performing that night was the culmination of my years growing up in the orchestra . . . and bridging that gap with my current career as a concert-hall composer and film/TV composer," he said a few days after the concert.

"It was quite literally living in two worlds. Playing took me back to my childhood, but the piece that we were playing was composed by me – bringing me to the present. It was exhilarating!"

Wineglass' passion for music has also led him to develop proficiency as a contemporary jazz and gospel pianist. He serves as music director for Shoreline Community Church.

He's been nominated for seven Daytime Emmy Awards and has won a trio of them, in the category ofOutstanding Achievement in Music Direction and Composition for a Drama Series; he's also won three ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards.

And he's performed for every U.S. president since Ronald Reagan (not to mention other world leaders, including former King Hussein of Jordan and President Mikhail Gorbachev of the Soviet Union).

At CSUMB, he teaches music and film, composition and musicianship, and theory.

Learn more about the music program at CSUMB.