About
Jefferson Todd Frazier
(October 2011 Performance of “Buffalo Altar” at Perini Ranch supporting the Buffalo Gap, TX Historic Village; middle 3, l-r: Barry Corbin, narrator; Todd Frazier, composer; and Stephen Harrigan, librettist)
Jefferson Todd Frazier is a composer, educator, non-profit leader and 6th generation Texan. He is the Director of The Center for Performing Arts Medicine at The Methodist Hospital in Houston, Founder of the American Festival for the Arts and Houston Arts Partners, and is the former Executive Director of Young Audiences of Houston. His work in the non-profit sector focuses on the arts as a unique and dynamic common denominator in strategic collaboration. He is currently leading research, education and accessibility collaborations between the K-12 Education, University, Texas Medical Center, and the Arts and Culture communities in Houston, TX. He received his undergraduate and graduate training from The Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, and The Juilliard School in New York, NY. He has been honored by the American Academy of Arts and Letters and serves as a Director of the Texas Lyceum, Member of the Eastman National Council and Fellow of the US-Japan Foundation Leadership Program. On the occasion of the Juilliard School’s 100th anniversary in 2006, Frazier was recognized as one of 100 distinguished alumni and profiled in the Juilliard Journal’s “A Quiet Revolution: Juilliard Alumni and The Transformation of Education in America Through the Arts.”
As a composer, his love for history inspires many of his works. Most recently; “Thomas Jefferson”, a large scale oratorio based on the extraordinary life and contributions of the third president of the United States, received its premiere at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. on April 3, 2011 by the National Symphony Orchestra, soprano Renee Fleming and conductor Christoph Eschenbach and has since been performed as part of Mrs. Fleming’s West coast Orchestral tour in March 2012 with the San Antonio, Portland, Seattle, Denver and Fresno Orchestras – “It’s a beautiful work and the words of the Declaration of Independence come to life in a powerful way. I’m so happy to be singing Todd’s piece for the first time and it’s particularly special for me to have premiered it in our nation’s capital,” Ms. Fleming; “Buffalo Altar; A Texas Symphony,” the story of Texas for narrator and orchestra (or piano), has become a popular highlight at literary and historical events across the state with narrators Lucian Douglass, Tommy Thompson and Barry Corbin; and “Save the World: In Memoriam Richard Smalley”, for narrator and orchestra, was written to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the 1985 discovery of nanotechnology at Rice University in Houston, TX. For more information please visit: www.jtoddfrazier.com
WEBSITES:
JToddjtoddfrazier.com
afatexas.org yahouston.org
houstonartspartners.org
methodistperformingarts.com
YOUTUBE:
youtube.com/user/Frazier
youtube.com/user/Arts4Learning
youtube.com/user/MethodistCPAM