David Jaeger
Composer, Producer, and Broadcaster
A celebrated figure in Canadian contemporary music, David Jaeger has spent decades shaping how new works are commissioned, performed, and heard.
David Jaeger is a music producer, composer, and broadcaster who created Two New Hours, an important contemporary music series in Canada, heard on the national CBC Radio Two network from 1978 to 2007. During that time he commissioned over 350 original musical works for presentation on air, and broadcast more than 3,000 world premiere performances.
He supported the creation of important new music festivals, such as the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's long running new music festival, broadcasting hundreds of live concerts. From 1974 to 2002 he served as the CBC Radio coordinator of the CBC/Radio Canada National Radio Competition for Young Composers, encouraging the establishment of a new wave of Canadian composers.
In the early 1970s, Jaeger established a digital sound synthesis facility at the University of Toronto, one of the first in Canada. In 1971 he co founded the Canadian Electronic Ensemble (CEE), the longest running live electronic ensemble in the world. With the CEE he commissioned dozens of new works for live electronic performance.
In 2002, Jaeger was elected President of the International Rostrum of Composers (IRC), and was the only non European ever named to this post. He served as IRC President for six years.
Jaeger's compositions range from chamber music to vocal and choral works and opera, as well as orchestral and electronic music. His works for string instruments, particularly lower register strings (viola and cello), form a large portion of his canon. His affinity for these instruments comes in part from the fact that his mother played viola, though the influence of several contemporary violists and cellists, such as violists Rivka Golani and Liz Reid, and cellists Noemie Raymond Friset, Rachel Mercer, and Winona Zelenka, have been even more of an influence.
Since his retirement from CBC in 2013, Jaeger has concentrated increasingly on compositions for solo instruments and voices. Many of these works have been inspired by literature, especially contemporary poetry. Jaeger has collaborated with several well known contemporary poets, such as the Canadian Bruce Whiteman, the Bengali Canadian Ayesha Chatterjee, and the Scotsman David Cameron.
David Jaeger was named a member of the Order of Canada in 2018.