John Oliver

At the age of 19, while a student at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Oliver gave up a performance career as a guitarist to dedicate himself to music composition, inspired by his teacher, John Adams. Nevertheless, he continues to perform as a chamber musician on classical and electric guitar in concerts of new music, chamber music, and improvised music, and has written several major works for the instrument, including a guitar concerto for Alexander Dunn, and solo and chamber music. John Oliver's “wonderfully, creative music” (Fanfare) displays “a delicate yet often complex sense of beauty” (Musicworks). Oliver creates award-winning music for musicians of the world, and in recent years has produced a body of new collaborative music where he acts as sound designer and composer using computer processing as his ‘instrument.’ Oliver believes that music should resonate the whole listener (emotion, mind, body). His music has been heard in performances in Europe, Asia and the Americas and appears on over 30 commercial and independent releases.