Dr. Frederick Harris Jr. is the conductor of the MIT Wind Ensemble. In 1999, he formed the ensemble at MIT. Dr. Harris is also the director of MIT's Festival Jazz Ensemble.
He was born in New Hampshire and earned a Masters Degree from the New England Conservatory of Music. His teachers have included Frank Battisti, Gunther Schuller, and Craig Kirchhoff. He earned his PhD from the University of Minnesota. He has served as guest conductor of the New Hampshire Philharmonic Orchestra, and spends his summers in Tanglewood.
Dr. Harris has commissioned more than 52 new pieces for various ensembles. He also brings musicians to MIT to play and work with his ensembles, including greats such as Ran Blake, Herb Pomeroy, Arni Cheatham, John Funkhouser, John Harbison, and Mark Harvey.
Harris has written the official biography of Stanislaw Skrowaczewski.
He lives on Cape Cod, with his wife, Becky, and their daughter, Abbie
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“For should your hands drop white and empty
All the toys of the world would break.”
—John Frederick Nims (b. 1913)
“The difference between patriotism and nationalism is that the patriot is proud of his country for what it does, and the nationalist is proud of his country no matter what it does; the first attitude creates a feeling of responsibility, but the second a feeling of blind arrogance that leads to war.”
—Sydney J. Harris (1917–1986)