Jennifer Jolley launches 2026-27 season with premieres, residencies and research

Composer and Lehman College music chair Jennifer Jolley is starting the 2026-27 academic year with new commissions, a recent world premiere, and a slate of residencies and festival appearances in the U.S. and Europe. Her latest work also includes an archival research project at Lehman tied to music preservation and digital access.

Why it matters: - Jennifer Jolley’s 2026-27 schedule shows her work moving across composition, performance, teaching and research at the same time. - The mix of premieres, residencies and archival work extends her reach beyond Lehman College and into the broader contemporary music field. - The new project on music preservation also adds an academic and digital-access component to her work.

What happened: - Jolley recently collaborated with the Florida State University Wind Ensemble on the world premiere of her new piece, The Space Coast. - The work is written for wind ensemble and soprano. - The Space Coast previews excerpts from Jolley’s forthcoming opera, Spacewalk. - Spacewalk tells the story of the first all-female spacewalk through seven vignettes. - Jolley is working on two new commissions, including a project involving hornist Steven Cohen and tubist and music educator Genevieve Clarkson. - Earlier in the summer, Jolley served on the faculty for the Composer’s Sandbox Summer Intensive at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. - The two-week program ran from May 31 to June 14. - Early-career composers studied with composition faculty and worked with members of Grammy Award-winning Eighth Blackbird. - The program ended with performances and recordings of participants’ work.

The details: - Jolley’s upcoming schedule includes a residency at Avaloch Farm Music Institute. - She will serve as distinguished guest composer at the University of Texas at San Antonio’s NuMu ’27 new music festival from March 2-4, 2027. - Her works are expected to appear in chamber music, choral, band and orchestral performances at the festival. - In May 2027, Jolley will join the faculty of the Alba Music Festival Composition Program in Alba, Italy. - The Alba program runs May 22-31, 2027. - Applications for the Alba Music Festival Composition Program are open through Dec. 15, 2026. - Jolley has a premiere scheduled in Miami during the first week of June 2027. - At Lehman College, Jolley has been accepted as a CUNY Summer 2026 Archives & Open Knowledge Faculty Fellow. - Her archival research project focuses on digitally encoding the Deborah Pacini Hernandez Music Collection. - The project aims to make the materials more accessible for study. - The archival work builds on her 2023 Fulbright Scholar experience in Egypt. - Jolley also returned to Cairo in 2025 to present research on digital archiving and music preservation. - Jolley serves on the Board of Directors of New Music USA and on the advisory panel for Music Resurgence Group.

Between the lines: - The new opera material suggests Jolley is developing larger-scale narrative work while still producing standalone concert pieces. - The archive project points to a broader interest in how music scholarship can be preserved and shared digitally. - Her role across university, festival and nonprofit settings shows a career that blends creative output with institutional leadership. - Jolley said her work draws toward political and provocative subjects because music can serve as a nonviolent voice that encourages debate and insight.

What's next: - Jolley’s next public milestones include the Avaloch Farm residency, the March 2027 festival appearance in San Antonio, the May 2027 Alba program and the June 2027 Miami premiere. - The Alba Music Festival Composition Program remains open for applications until Dec. 15, 2026. - More information is available on Jolley’s website and her LinkedIn profile. - Media inquiries go to Skylar Peterson at speterson@tempo-comms.com or (774) 571-1357.