Jan Jarvlepp

Composer and cellist Jan Järvlepp writes music in a style he describes as European/American fusion. Influenced by his own background in rock music, he has also drawn on Hispanic, flamenco, Arab, and Nordic folk styles, often creating works with unique combinations of instruments. Järvlepp was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, on January 3, 1953. His parents were Finnish and Estonian and had come to Canada after World War II. Järvlepp retained Finnish citizenship as well as Canadian, and Finnish was the language spoken at home during his childhood; he began to speak English regularly only in kindergarten. (He later learned French as well.) Järvlepp took piano lessons as a child but soon gave up on them. He took up pop guitar at 12 and the cello at 14, also studying bass guitar and harmonica. Järvlepp began trying to create novel melodies and sounds on his guitar, realizing only gradually that what he was doing was composing. As a teen, Järvlepp was a rock and soul music enthusiast, attending concerts by the likes of Jimi Hendrix, The Beach Boys, Wilson Pickett, and James Brown, but he also played cello in the Ottawa Youth Orchestra. He earned degrees in composition and cello at the University of Ottawa, McGill University in Montreal, and the University of California at San Diego. His teachers included Luis de Pablo, Alcides Lanza, Will Ogdon, and Roger Reynolds. Järvlepp's composition career got off to a shaky start when his orchestral work Ice, which had been performed by the University of Ottawa Orchestra in 1976, had its orchestral parts thrown in the trash by one composition professor, while another complimented Järvlepp on his handwriting. Järvlepp's relationship to contemporary academic composition, then, was a troubled one, and after he returned to Ottawa in 1981, he began to explore neo-tonal styles and to reincorporate pop influences into his music; he describes himself as scarred for life by them. Järvlepp made a living as a cellist with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra for 38 years and also performed with the Palm Court Orchestra in Ottawa, the Nepean Symphony Orchestra, and other regional groups. Järvlepp scored breakthroughs when the Ottawa Symphony performed his Camerata Music in 1993 and his Garbage Concerto, a "concerto for recycled percussion" featuring metallic and glass objects he had found in his own trash, in 1996. The latter work was widely performed and was recorded by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra and conductor Lan Shui in 2000. Järvlepp's description of his music as European/American fusion has been questioned by Canadians, but he rejoins that the pop elements in his music are of American rather than Canadian origin, noting that he is not a fan of country singer Hank Snow or teen pop star Paul Anka. A later work that brought Järvlepp success was In Memoriam for string orchestra or string quintet, written after his brother's death from cancer. Järvlepp retired from the Ottawa Symphony in 2019 and has since devoted full-time to composition. As of 2024, more than 20 of his works had been recorded.
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