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Joe Sheehan

Joseph Sheehan is a composer, pianist, and educator immersed in classical, jazz, and world musics. In his music Sheehan aims to share joy, depth, and beauty, connecting with artists and audiences of diverse musical communities.

Sheehan’s music celebrates and explores a tapestry of both song and dance, forms at the root of many musical cultures throughout the world. An independent study of traditional song and dance in Ghana, West Africa, from 2008-09, was especially influential on Sheehan’s musical language. West African music, as well as jazz, has informed recent pieces such as Vibraphone Loops, for vibes and tape, featuring a solo percussionist accompanied by soulful harmonies and synth loops; and Dances from Afar, a suite of three distinctive dances for violin and piano. Sheehan has also written nine original songs for the ensemble Kinetic, a group of creative jazz musicians fluent in a diversity of musical styles. Kinetic released their debut album World of Wonder in November 2014, with radioplay on WESA and WYEP. An East Coast tour in summer 2015 is planned. Sheehan's most recent projectis a full-length suite of music based on Ghanaian folk songs, drawing from research in Ghana funded by the 2014 Rev. Alphons Loogman Faculty Research Grant from Duquesne University.

Ensembles performing Sheehan’s music include the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, percussionist Lisa Pegher, the Alea III Ensemble, Ovrearts, and the Kuttner Quartet. Upcoming performances include Concert of Millenials in Northern California (Dances from Afar), and Cultures in Harmony in the Philippines (A Song for Peace). In 2007 the Indiana University New Music Ensemble performed Suspended in Perpetual Ascent in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, and New York City as part of an East Coast tour; and the American Composers Orchestra read Sail Away to Soft, Sweet Bells at the 2005 Underwood New Music Readings. Sheehan has won top composition prizes from BMI, NFMC, and Indiana University, and was a fellow at the 2008 Aspen Summer Music Festival. As a pianist Sheehan performs jazz and R&B all over the Pittsburgh area, including the 2014 Three Rivers Arts Festival, the 2011 Pittsburgh International JazzLive Festival and the Three Rivers Arts Festival. He has founded two ensembles: Kinetic, performing original songs influenced by afropop, R&B, and jazz; and Trio+, a trio that plays an imaginative, continuous blend of hip-hop, pop, and R&B, often in collaboration with rappers and vocalists. He is also music director of Groove Aesthetic, an artist collective producing innovative genre-bending concerts; and Cross Currents, which hosts a weekly jazz fusion jam session. He was a 2011 Jazzspace resident artist, receiving funding and performing at a showcase concert.

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

World of Wonder

Self Produced
2014

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Will not Forget

From: World of Wonder
By Joe Sheehan

Proverb

From: World of Wonder
By Joe Sheehan

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