"I have found Jericho to be one of the most effective pieces I have ever had the pleasure to conduct.  There is no doubt it makes a lasting impression on the audience.  Jericho was "the hit" of the program whenever we performed it.  People LOVED it.  The audience just kept talking about your piece after our performances." —Prof. Terry Treuden, Director of Instrumental Music, Wisconsin Lutheran College.

May 2010.  The Concert Band of the Winsconsin Lutheran College, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, under the direction of Dr. Terry Treuden, will be performing Jesse Ayers' Jericho May 7 in Milwaukee,WI;  May 17 in St. Paul, MN;  May 19 at Black Hills State University in North Dakota; and May 21 in Denver, CO.

The 16-minute theater-piece employs narrator, surround-sound placement of the musicians, and unorthodox audience participation.

March 11, 2010.  "[I have been] listening to [The Passion of John Brown] with score in hand. It is an amazing work, beautifully paced and orchestrated. I love it. If it weren't that I have retired from conducting, I would be figuring out a way to program it."
                                —David Daniels
                                    author of Orchestral Music, A Handbook

Jesse Ayers' The Passion of John Brown for orchestra and narrator, premiered October 17, 2009, performed by the Akron Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Christopher Wilkins with Broadcasters' Hall of Fame inductee Leon Bibb narrating.         

The 19-minute work was commissioned by the orchestra in observance of the 150th anniversary of John Brown's raid on the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry which helped spark the American Civil War.       

Brown lived in the Akron area for many years and is among its most famous citizens.

Assisting in the performance were Malone University vocal majors Matthew Clear, Daniel Liebman, and Andrew Black [in photo at left], all of whom have studied music analysis with Dr. Ayers.

The concert date was the exact anniversary of the Harper's Ferry raid.

Maestro Wilkins conceived the idea of commissioning a narrated work about Brown and suggested the marvelous, double-entendre title.

John Brown died a controversial figure, demonized by some and admired by others.  Ayers' work tells John Brown's story, the good and the bad, through Brown's own words, as well as the words of two of Brown's surviving offspring, Brown's friend abolitionist Fredrick Douglass, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, who witnessed Brown's hanging, and the widow of a man Brown ordered killed. It also quotes John Brown's favorite hymn, Blow Ye the Trumpet, Blow, and uses musical material from the hymn as symbolic bugle calls echoed by surround-sound trumpets.

May 14, 2009. Jesse Ayers' Waldstein Express for 2-pianos 8-hands was performed on the opening concert of the Slobomir International Music Competition in Bijeljina, Repubic of Srpska. The work was performed by students of Professor Dubravka Jovicic, Ph.D., Dean of the Faculty, Belgrade, Serbia.

There were five students who wanted to perform this piece, so to add to the humor of the piece, the fifth player meanders in as though he is a passerby, and rotates into the piece.  What enthusiasm in this performance! 

November 2-3, 2008. For the second time this year, Jesse Ayers' Dance of the Mountain Raindrops for piano and string orchestra has aired on Serbia's national television-radio network, RTS.  On Sunday night, a portion of the work was televised as part of an RTS retrospective celebrating the highlights of its past 50 years of broadcasting. The entire work was broadcast again on Monday night on RTS radio.  RTS broadcast the same work in full on television and radio in March.

The performance featured concert pianist Dubravka Jovicic, Ph.D., of Belgrade, Serbia, and the RTS Symphony Orchestra.  Jovicic and the orchestra recorded Ayers' work in 1992 when it was selected for a the inaugural broadcast of a then new RTS-TV series World Premiere, a weekly program dedicated to premiering new concert works by living composers.

December 2007.  Jesse Ayers' Veni Emmanuel for chorus and orchestra was performed December 12, 13, and 14, by the Summit Choral Society (Akron, OH) under the direction of Dr. Frank Jacobs.  The work is a processional piece.  The men begin singing softly in unison, like chant, from behind the audience.  Then the orchestra begins playing the 14th-century hymn while the choir solomnly process in.  From its dark, sombre beginning, the work becomes progressively brighter until the climactic "Rejoice! Rejoice!"

September 2007. Jesse Ayers has been named a recipient of a 2007 Award from the Amercian Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers. The awards are announced annually by ASCAP and are determined by a panel of distinguished experts. This is the 16th consecutive year that Ayers has been so honored by ASCAP.

March 2006. Jesse Ayers' newest composition, Jericho, will be performed on tour by the Wind Symphony of Concordia University Chicago under the baton of Dr. Richard Fischer.  The 60-member ensemble will perform in St. Louis, Little Rock, Memphis, Peachtree City, GA, Pensacola, Mobile, Houstin, and Austin before their final home concert in Chicago.

Jericho is a dramatic, surround-sound composition for orchestra or band, plus narrator, that features unorthodox audience participation.

 This is the second time that Fischer and the Concordia Wind Symphony have taken Ayers' music on tour. In March of 2000, they toured California with Ayers'...and they gathered on Mount Carmel, a major 25-minute, three-movement work for wind orchestra based on the great Old Testament contest between Elijah and the false prophets of Baal.

April 2005. Jesse Ayers' newest composition, Jericho, will be premiered by the Valparaiso University Chamber Concert Band under the direction of Dr. Jeffrey Scott Doebler.  Jericho is a dramatic, surround-sound composition for orchestra or band, plus narrator, that features unorthodox audience participation. 

This is the second time that Doebler and the Valparaiso Chamber Concert Band have premiered Ayers' music. In October 1999, they were the first ensemble to perform Ayers'...and they gathered on Mount Carmel, a major 25-minute, three-movement work for wind orchestra based on the great Old Testament contest between Elijah and the false prophets of Baal.

September 2003. Jesse Ayers is one of six American composers whose music has been selected by the International Society for Contemporary Music to represent the United States at the prestigious World Music Days festival.  His work, The Fire of the Living God, was selected by an international jury of distinguished composers.

This is the second time Ayers has been honored by the ISCM. In 1992, his The Dancing King for solo tuba and pre-recorded accompaniment was performed in Warsaw, Poland, at World Music Days '92.  The festival will be attended by musicians and music lovers from around the globe.