Jean Knific is a multi-talented and unique pianist/composer, whose music fuses varied elements in fascinating and compelling ways.
She is an engaging artist on a great trajectory.
— Shelly Berg, Grammy nominated pianist, composer, and arranger
 
 

Pianist, composer, and arranger Jean Knific is the recipient of four ASCAP Jazz Composers awards and eight Down Beat Magazine Music Awards for their performances and compositions in jazz and contemporary categories.

Over the past three years, Jean has had 40 orchestral arrangements and compositions recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London. She is currently helping to compose and orchestrate a large scale seven-album-length classical and progressive rock hybrid project by leader of the award winning band Syzygy, Carl Baldassarre. This project has led Knific to work directly with legendary conductor, composer, and arrangers Rick Wentworth (Roger Waters, Danny Elfman) and James Shearman (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Aladin, Beauty and the Beast), and Sweetwater Production’s director of music production Mark Hornsby (Peter Erskine, Beth Hart, Big Big Train). In 2019, Knific arranged the theme to the HBO smash-hit Game of Thrones and performed it along with the three-time Grammy nominated Spektral Quartet at Symphony Center in Chicago. The arrangement was performed for George R.R. Martin, author of the Game of Thrones series. In 2020 Spektral Quartet premiered their arrangement of Sufjan Steven’s Arnika in their Totally Obsessed series.

An active composer in both jazz and chamber music settings, she recently had her work, SEPTET, performed at the Ravinia Festival in 2019 and 2018. The piece, written for a combined string quartet and jazz piano trio, was premiered by Billy Test (WDR Big Band) and the Avalon String Quartet, who are in residence at Northern Illinois Unviersity. In 2016, Knific had their piece, Relapse, performed by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. In 2017, their Concerto for Violoncello and Chamber String Orchestra was premiered at the University of Oklahoma. Earlier in 2016, Knific was commissioned to write ten Great American Songbook arrangements for The Merling Trio, which will culminate in an album to be released later this year.

In 2015, Jean was invited to participate in the American Composer’s Orchestra Jazz Composers Orchestra Intensive at UCLA directed by James Newton and Derek Bermel and was mentored by composer and University of Chicago professor, Anthony Cheung. While in university, Knific had their works rehearsed by Dave Douglas, Mark O'Connor, and Terrence Blanchard. Jean wrote a work for big band performed and recorded featuring classic rock icon Steve Miller and had three crossover works commissioned by the Stamps Foundation Distinguished Ensembles in Miami. In addition, she won a reading by members of the Cleveland Orchestra, conducted by James Feddeck at The Adrienne Arsht Center in Miami. In 2017, Knific released a self-produced documentary sponsored by a grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Jean has performed all over the world with an extensive and diverse repertoire. Highlights include performances with saxophone legend Joe Lovano in 2014, Macarthur Genius Grant recipient Miguel Zenón, and three performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. with the Betty Carter Jazz Ahead program directed by Jason Moran.  Their talents have brought her on tours to Russia at The St. Petersburg Conservatory and Jazz Philharmonic, the Copenhagen Opera House and Montmartre Jazzhus in Denmark, the Xiquitsi International Music Festival in Mozambique, and The Schlern International Music Festival in Italy

Knific graduated with highest honors from the University of Miami Frost School of Music with degrees in jazz performance and composition, where she studied with Shelly Berg, Martin Bejerano, Lansing McLoskey, and Terence Blanchard.

Jean currently resides in Chicago, where she teaches at The Voice Lab, Inc., a music and speech studio dedicated to serving queer and transgender communities internationally. They play synthesizers in and act as assistant to the regional manager of IVERSON, the official band of Planet Earth.