Ben Allison

Bassist, composer, producer, educator Ben Allison has been performing and recording his own brand of original music for nearly three decades. He has released 19 albums as a main or featured artist, 7 of which reached #1 on the national jazz radio charts, garnering him 9 SESAC Performance Awards. His most recent album, Moments Inside (2021) is the fourth to be released on his own Sonic Camera Records label.

As a bandleader, he has organized and led many tours throughout the world, headlining at international festivals, concert halls, theaters, and clubs, including The Newport Jazz Festival, North Sea Jazz Festival, London Jazz Festival, Carnegie Hall (New York City), Teatro Manzoni (Milan), Theatro Roberto Cantoral (Mexico City), Central Park’s SummerStage (New York City), Auditório Ibirapuera (Sao Paulo), The Capitol Theater (Salt Lake City), Walt Disney Concert Hall (Los Angeles) and Queen Elizabeth Hall (London), among countless others.

Ben is an active voice for artists rights, education and empowerment. At the age of 25, he formed the Jazz Composers Collective, a non-profit organization that fostered and presented new music. He served as the organization’s Executive Director from 1992 until 2005. He produced or co-produced over 100 concerts and special events, including the Collective’s annual concert series (which ran for eleven seasons), national and international tours by Collective artists, an on-going residency at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA, NYC), and, in partnership with the United States Embassy, a series of concerts and educational activities in Sao Paulo and Campinas, Brazil. From 2001-2005 Ben organized an annual “Jazz Composers Collective Festival” at the Jazz Standard — which drew international attention as “..a mainstay of New York City’s cultural life” (New Yorker Magazine).

Ben served two terms as President of the New York Chapter of the Recording Academy and chaired the Advocacy Committee for 7 years. He testified in front of Congress in 2012 and was an effective lobbyist in support of the Music Modernization Act, the most significant reform of copyright law in the past 40 years.

Ben researches and teaches courses focused on entrepreneurship and the ever-evolving music business as well as music technology and music theory. He helped develop the CoPA Core curriculum class Socially Engaged Artistry and gives individualized instruction in bass performance and composition. He has been researching, performing and recording the music of pianist/composer Herbie Nichols since 1991 and has recorded three albums of largely unpublished Nichol’s works, with a fourth to be released in 2024. He currently serves as a co-chair of the University Faculty Senate and sits on various UFS and TNS committees, including the CoPA Executive Committee, the University Budget Committee and the UFS Governance Committee.

Ben wrote the theme for the popular NPR radio program On the Media, which is heard by over 1,500,000 listeners weekly, and has written music for numerous TV commercials, short films and theatrical productions. As a bassist, he has appeared on over 100 albums by various artists and has received commissioning, performing, and recording grants from Chamber Music America, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Aaron Copland Foundation, The Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, Meet the Composer, and the American Composers Forum, among others.

In 2005, 2008 and 2013, he was featured composer and performer with the Jazz Sinfonica, an 80-piece symphony orchestra based in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Ben performed his Carnegie Hall debut in 2012.