2013 Herb Pomeroy Jazz Composition & Arranging Award

BerkleeJazz.org is pleased to announce the Third Annual Herb Pomeroy Jazz Composition/Arranging Contest, sponsored by Berklee College of Music's Jazz Composition Department and Professional Writing Division. The winning piece will be performed by the Berklee Rainbow Band (under the direction of Phil Wilson) at the 2013 High School Jazz Festival, happening this year on March 2, 2013 at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, MA.In addition, the winner will receive a full scholarship to the Berklee 5-week Summer Performance Program and a $300.00 cash prize!

2013 Winner

2013 Herb Pomeroy Winner, Aditya Raguram

The March 2, 2013 winner of the Herb Pomeroy Jazz Composition / Arranging Contest is Aditya Raguram, from Princeton, New Jersey!

Aditya Raguram is a junior at Princeton High School in Princeton, NJ. He studies jazz piano with Ted Rosenthal (Manhattan School of Music, The Juilliard School) and classical piano with Galina Prilutskaya (Westminster Conservatory). His winning composition is entitled “Remember,” a piece featuring trumpet and saxophone section. Other awards that he has won include the Westminster Conservatory’s piano concerto competition, the UK’s Royal School of Music Hedy King Robinson prize for music theory, and Berklee Jazz Festival’s superior musicianship award. Aditya is the pianist for the NJ All-State Jazz Ensemble, Philadelphia Jazz Orchestra, Princeton Studio Band, and other jazz ensembles. He has performed at the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, and other locations in US, Switzerland, Germany, France, and Italy. Aditya plans to pursue both applied physics and music in college.

Past Winners

2012 Winner

This year's winner of Herb Pomeroy Jazz Composition/Arranging Contest is Frank Rein, from Princeton, New Jersey.

Frank is a senior at Princeton High School. His winning piece is entitled "I Think I'll Miss You Most Of All" will be performed by the Berklee Rainbow Band (under the direction of Phil Wilson) today at 6:00 p.m. in the Veterans Memorial Auditorium, Second Level. In addition, Rein will receive a full scholarship to the Berklee Five-Week Summer Performance Program. Rein is a bass trombonist and has studied with Scott Grimaldi for two years.

2011 Herb Pomeroy Winner, John Sturm
2011 Winner

John Sturm from Princeton, NJ was the 2011 winner. His winning piece was a ballad entitled Autumn Lament and featured the lead trombone. John’s hobbies include jazz piano, composition, ultimate frisbee, math, and philosophy. His music teachers include Neal Kirkwood, Laurie Altmun and Susanne Lehrer. He is planning on majoring in math and minoring in music in college. John Sturm’s winning piece will be performed by the Berklee Concert Jazz Orchestra (under the direction of Greg Hopkins) at the High School Jazz Festival on March 5th at 2:00 p.m in the Veterans Memorial Auditorium, Second Level of the Hynes Convention Center.

Read more about John...

Who was Herb Pomeroy?

He joined the Berklee faculty as a full-time teacher in 1955 and developed several courses that eventually cemented his reputation as one of jazz’s greatest teachers. Pomeroy’s appreciation for and endless study of Duke Ellington’s music informed much of his classroom work and helped spawn scores of talented musicians, including producer Arif Mardin, The Simpsons composer Alf Clausen, composer-arrangers Alan Broadbent and Rob Mounsey, vibraphonist Gary Burton, keyboardist Joe Zawinul, bassist Abe Laboriel Sr., film composers Mike Gibbs and Alan Silvestri, and many others.

Herb released many CDs as a leader and co-leader and appeared on dozens of recordings as a sideman, including sessions with Charlie Parker and Charlie Mariano. He began playing professionally in high school and went on the road in the early 1950s with bands led by Lionel Hampton, Stan Kenton, and Serge Chaloff.