James Cohn

Who is James Cohn?

James Cohn is an American composer born in 1928 in Newark, New Jersey. After taking violin and piano lessons in his native town, he studied composition with Roy Harris, Wayne Barlow and Bernard Wagenaar, and majored in Composition at Juilliard, graduating in 1950.

He has written solo, chamber, choral and orchestral works, among them 3 string quartets, 5 piano sonatas and 8 symphonies. He was awarded a Queen Elisabeth of Belgium Prize for his Symphony No. 2 and an A.I.D.E.M. prize for his Symphony No. 4.

His Symphony No. 3 and Variations on "The Wayfaring Stranger" were premiered by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Paul Paray. The Detroit Free Press observed in the Symphony No. 3 "an economy of means . . . but no yielding of inventiveness or imaginative composition. Indeed, the work throughout is marked strongly by individuality, and comes as a refreshing experience in modern music."

Among his earlier works is a concertino for piano and orchestra.

In 1966 he composed a three-movement Concerto for Concertina and Strings, as his Op. 44.

In 2008 his 2nd and 7th symphonies were issued on compact disc by the Naxos label.