About
Composer James Bernard writes music that spans concert works, vocal and chamber music, large-scale orchestral pieces, and popular genres, including pop and hip-hop. His work is driven by a desire to balance accessibility with expressive depth, often foregrounding rhythm, groove, and clearly articulated musical gestures. Across genres, he is particularly interested in how musical form can reflect lived experience through cycles, return, and transformation.
James is an undergraduate composition student at The Juilliard School, where he studies with Dr. Melinda Wagner. He previously attended Juilliard’s Pre-College Division and Mannes Prep as a Clara Mannes Scholar, and has studied composition with Manuel Sosa, Mary Kouyoumdjian, David Dzubay, and Martin Amlin.
His music has received national recognition and has been performed and scheduled for performance in a variety of concert settings. He is the recipient of First Prize in the Ruth Crawford Seeger Prize, and his work has been recognized by organizations including the American Prize and the Young Composers Conference.
In addition to composing, James is an active violinist, singer, and musical theater performer, experiences that strongly inform his approach to writing for performers. Outside of music, he enjoys long walks through Central Park and listening widely across musical styles and historical periods.
Composing isn’t just expressing ideas, but creating worlds
Every piece is a story. Notes are just a means to an end.
Music is universal to those who open themselves up to it
Artistic StatementI have been writing music for as long as I can remember, and I still do not fully understand why. Not in a romantic, mysterious way. I mean that genuinely. There is something that happens when I sit down at the desk that I cannot explain in any other terms except that it feels necessary, like breathing, or arguing
I grew up moving between worlds. Conservatory training at Mannes, then Juilliard Pre-College, now Juilliard College. LaGuardia High School for drama. The stage on one side, the score on the other. Most people told me to pick one. I never could, and I stopped trying. What I found instead is that they feed each other in ways that are hard to articulate but easy to hear. When I write for voice, I think like an actor. When I perform, I hear the orchestration underneath. I do not think of myself as a composer who also acts, or an actor who also composes. I think of myself as someone who tells stories, and I use whatever the story needs.
I have written over a hundred compositions across almost every format: full orchestra, string quartet, chamber ensemble, song cycle, and musical theater. My first piano work. My first concerto. A tone poem. A symphony. An original one-act, Sweet Times, that I am still developing. Each piece has asked something different of me, and I have tried to answer honestly every time.
Collaboration is central to how I work. I have scored plays, written for specific performers, and taken commissions from orchestras. I believe that the best work happens when you are genuinely in conversation with another person, when their instincts push back against yours, and the result is something neither of you would have made alone.