Anthony Branker

Senior Lecturer in Music; Associate Director, Program in Musical Performance

Anthony D.J. Branker is Senior Lecturer in Music and Conductor of University Jazz Ensembles at Princeton University. Recently, he was named a Fulbright Scholar and lectured at the Estonian Academy of Music in Tallinn, Estonia during the fall semester of 2005. He has also been honored by the United States Department of Education with a Presidential Scholars Teacher Recognition Award, the Institute for Arts and Humanities Education Distinguished Teaching Award, the International Association of Jazz Educators Award for Outstanding Service to Jazz Education, and was the recipient of the 2004 Alumni Award presented by the Association of Black Princeton Alumni.

Mr. Branker has served as a member of the jazz faculty at the Manhattan School of Music and was Professor of Music, Director of Jazz Studies, and Director of Performance Studies at Hunter College of the City University of New York. He has also served as Chairperson of the Department of Music at Ursinus Collge, where he was a member of the faculty for ten years, and as Instrumental Music Coordinator and Head of Jazz Studies for the New Jersey Summer Arts Institute at Rutgers University. He has appeared as guest jazz conductor with the Jugend Sinfonie Orchester (Bremen, Germany), Kiryat Ono Symphonic Youth Band (Israel), Fukui Junior Orchestra (Fukui, Japan), the New Jersey IAJE Intercollegiate & Region II High School All State Jazz Ensembles, and has led performances that have featured the Princeton University Orchestra, Chapel Choir, Glee Club/Concert Choir, and Gospel Ensemble. While at Princeton, Mr. Branker has directed two national award-winning jazz groups, including the Monk/Mingus Ensemble, winner of the Down Beat magazine Student Music Award for “Best Jazz Instrumental Group,” and Ensemble X, recipient of a 2003 Down Beat music award for “Outstanding Performance.”

As a composer, Branker has received two composition prizes from the International Association for Jazz Education and two commissions from The Commission Project¨. He has also served as a composer-in-residence and has had his music featured in performance in Russia, France, Finland, Germany, Lithuania, New York’s Symphony Space, and at ASCAP’s Jazz Songwriters Showcase at the Fez under the Time CafŽ. His most recent CD project, Spirit Songs, is on the Sounds of Sound record label and features Branker’s ensemble ‘Ascent’ in a program of eight original works with performances by alto & soprano saxophonist Antonio Hart, tenor & soprano saxophonist Ralph Bowen, trombonist Clifford Adams Jr., pianist Jonny King, bassist John Benitez, and drummer Ralph Peterson Jr.

As a trumpeter, Branker has performed and recorded with the Spirit of Life Ensemble– including a five-year residency at New York’s internationally renowned ‘Sweet Basil’ jazz club. He has also performed at a variety of festivals, concert halls and clubs in the United States and abroad, including such locales as Russia, Finland, France, Germany, Lithuania, and Estonia. He has worked in a variety of musical settings with such artists as Ted Curson, Talib Kibwe, Guilherme Franco & Nova Bossa Nova, Michael Cochrane, Steve Nelson, Eddie Henderson, Rick Margitza, Gary Burton, Stanley Jordan, Benny Carter, Ralph Peterson, Terence Blanchard, Roscoe Mitchell, the R&B group Tavares, and has performed in the critically acclaimed Off-Broadway production Dinah Was: The Dinah Washington Musical.

Professor Branker has received fellowships or grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Rutgers Institute of Jazz Studies, and Ursinus College. He has appeared as a lecturer for the University Alumni College Seminar, “New Orleans: City of Jazz” (New Orleans, Louisiana), the Plexus Music Society and the International Association of Jazz Educators and has had numerous articles published; ranging in topic from the music of Cuba and its influence on American music to an examination of the blues and jazz in African-American poetry.

Mr. Branker holds a Master of Music in Jazz Pedagogy from the University of Miami as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Music and a Certificate in African-American Studies from Princeton University. He is currently working towards his Doctorate in Education at Columbia University’s Teachers College.