James Yannatos

Who was James Yannatos?

James Yannatos was a composer, conductor, violinist and teacher. He was a senior lecturer at Harvard University until his retirement in the spring of 2009.

Yannatos was born and educated in New York City, In 1943, he was invited to attend Camp Rising Sun, a tuition-free, international summer camp in upstate New York. He attended the High School of Music and Art and the Manhattan School of Music. Subsequent studies with Nadia Boulanger, Luigi Dallapiccola, Darius Milhaud, Paul Hindemith, and Philip Bezanson in composition, William Steinberg and Leonard Bernstein in conducting, and Hugo Kortschak and Ivan Galamian on violin took Yannatos to Yale University, the University of Iowa, Aspen, Tanglewood, and Paris. As a young violinist, he performed at the Casals Festival and elsewhere in various professional ensembles, including a piano trio, a string quartet, and early music groups with Hindemith and Boulanger.

In 1964, he was appointed music director of the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra, and led that group on tours to Europe, Russia, South America, and Asia.