Barbara London Jazz & Watercolors

Barbara London is a musician, artist, educator, and writer.  She has played across the US and received three National Endowment for the Arts grants for her jazz performance as a flutist, vocalist, and pianist. Her long career in the arts has involved leading her own groups, composing for jazz and classical ensembles, producing recordings for her wild aster label, exhibiting her artwork in solo and group shows, and teaching at the University of Maine, Augusta, and Berklee College of Music in Boston. She chaired the Berklee Harmony Department for 10 years. After nearly 25 years in college education and administration, Barbara is now focusing on her painting, recording, and composing. 

 

Performance

• Leader of the Barbara London Quartet

• Recipient of three National Endowment for the Arts jazz performance grant

• Recipient of NH State Council on the Arts Fellowship

• Producer/owner: wild aster productions, independent label

• Numerous recordings as leader and side person

• Appearances in nearly half of the US continental states and abroad

• Performances with Marian McPartland, Joe Newman, Clark Terry, Janet Lawson, Jane Ira Bloom, Cecil McBee, Phil Wilson, Richard Davis, Larry Baione, John Lockwood, Ed Saindon,  Rick Kress, Jim Lyden, Gary Gemmiti, and Woody Allen.

• Reviews in major newspapers and periodicals

•  Credits: Newport Jazz Festival in NYC, Carnegie recital Hall, United Nation, Kansas City Women’s Jazz Festival, Portsmouth Jazz festival, Lincoln Center Plaza

• Guest artist/recordings with John Perrault, Phil Wilson, Alizon Lissance, Mike Rogers,  Jim MacDougall and the Funky Divas of Gospel, Do’a, Buddy Schute, Woody Allen, and others. 

 

Composition

• Numerous compositions for jazz ensemble

• Songs and vocal arrangements 

• Chamber works (for piano, flute, double bass) 

• Recordings feature original composition

• Knut Guettler, Norweigian bassist, recorded bass piece, "Almost Spring",  on Japanese Camarata label

• Performances by classical bassists at Universities of Kentucky and Wisconsin

• Grants: Meet the Composer and New Hampshire Fellowship

  

Art

• Primary medium: watercolors 

• Paintings are in private collections in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Texas, Colorado, and Florida

• Studio 549, Upper Mill, at Salmon Falls Mills in Rollinsford NH

• Open Studios 2006-2018, November and May

• Solo Show: Lane Library, Hampton NH 2017

• Solo exhibit at Blue Moon Gallery, Houlton, Maine June-Aug, 2010

• Solo exhibit at Webster at Rye, Feb-March 2010

• Solo exhibit at Provident Bank, Portsmouth NH, Winter 2009

• Group exhibits include: Newburyport Art Association, Seacoast Art Association, Exeter NH, 100 Market Street, Portsmouth, NH; Exeter Town Hall Gallery, NH; Visions in Houlton, Maine:;  Dover Library, NH; Private Show, Salisbury, MA, Discovery Center, Rye, NH, Exeter Library, NH, and others. 

•Member of Abstract Artists Group of New England, annual group shows at Newburyport Art Association, MA 

 •Hanging member of Seacoast Art Association, downtown Exeter NH

 

Education

• Nearly 25 years of college teaching and administrating at the University of Maine at Augusta and Berklee College of Music in Boston.  

• First female Chair at Berklee, 1994-2003, Harmony Department, .  

• Courses taught: Harmony (theory), Jazz Composition, Instrumental and Vocal Ensembles, Blues Analysis and Application

• Numerous clinics, residencies,  workshops at colleges and schools throughout the US, including the Universities of Wisconsin, New Mexico, Maine, and NH.

• Author of two study supplements available through the Berklee bookstore, companion books to Harmony Department workbooks.

• Paper/presentation: Amsterdam Conservatory 1999

      Journal article in “Tijdschrift voor Muziektheorie” Nov. 1999

• Classes taught: Harmony, Jazz  Composition, Ensembles, Vocal coaching, Blues History and Analysis