Gregory Barrett

Associate Professor
D.Mus., Indiana University

Office:   815-753-8004
E-mail: gregbarrett@niu.edu
Web:  http://www.niu.edu/~gbarrett

           NIU Clarinet Cornucopia

Dr. Gregory Barrett, associate professor of clarinet and chamber music at Northern Illinois University, is a master teacher and performer. He has presented recitals and classes throughout the United States, and in Australia, Austria, Canada, China, Denmark, Finland, and Japan. Dr. Barrett is a graduate of Northwestern University, SUNY-Buffalo, and Indiana University. Barrett takes special delight in the achievements of his students.  In 2004, the premiere winner of the Northern Illinois University Concerto Competition was a member of Barrett’s clarinet studio.

Currently performing with the Ars Viva Symphony, Elgin Symphony Orchestra, and the Lake Forest Symphony Orchestra he has been bass clarinetist with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, as well as with numerous other orchestras in the Carolinas, Virginia, Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa. He has been a Buffet Clarinets Artist-Clinician since 2000.

Inspired by the music of Jean Sibelius, Dr. Barrett has developed a wide-reaching interest in Finnish music and culture. The Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs sponsored Dr. Barrett's research in Finland to meet with contemporary composers of works for the clarinet. Resulting from this trip were Barrett's dissertation and The Finnish Clarinet, released by ALBA CDs, Finland. Expanding on his interest in Scandinavian music to include Denmark, Barrett recently completed sabbatical work researching Danish clarinet music.

Barrett frequently collaborates with composers in their new works.  In July 2005 he twice performed Paul Moravec’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Tempest Fantasy under Moravec’s guidance at the Mammoth Lakes Chamber Music Festival, California. He has premiered works by Lasse Jalava and David Maki.

For the International Clarinet Association (I.C.A.), Dr. Barrett is Illinois State Chair and Editor of Reviews for the association’s quarterly The Clarinet. As a composer and arranger, Barrett has written several works featuring the clarinet. OR-TAV Publishers has available his klezmer pieces for clarinet trio, clarinet choir, and clarinet solo with band. His reconstruction of Jean Sibelius's lost En Saga Septet is available from Breitkopf & Härtel, Wiesbaden, Germany and Edition Wilhelm Hansen, Copenhagen is considering publication of his arrangement for clarinet and piano of Carl Nielsen’s Chaconne, Op. 32. Dr. Barrett premiered the En Saga Septet with members of the Lahti (Finland) Sinfonia Chamber Ensemble in June 2003 in Vienna's Musikverein.