Jeff Beal

Known for synthesizing improvisatory and composed elements, composer and trumpeter Jeff Beal weaves strands of jazz, classical, and new age tradition into his complex yet always accessible music. He also orchestrates, conducts, records, and mixes his own compositions, giving his music a very personal, distinctive touch. This is evidenced on solo jazz and orchestral recordings including 1998's concerto for orchestra entitled Red Shift, 2000's Three Graces, 2018's House of Cards Symphony, as well as on 2024's The New York Études for solo piano and on his film and television soundtracks. Among the five-time Emmy winner's most high-profile scores are his work on the TV series Monk, Carnivàle, and House of Cards. Beal was born June 20, 1963, in Hayward, California, and began studying the trumpet in the third grade. He wrote his first long-form composition while he was a student in high school, and his merging of improvisation and classical composition would become his professional signature. He studied composition and trumpet at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, graduating in 1985. Beal then moved to New York City, where he recorded 1988's Liberation, for Island Records, the first of several solo albums. His Island follow-up, Perpetual Motion, arrived a year later. He moved to the Triloka label for his next four albums: 1991's Objects in the Mirror, 1993's Three Graces, 1994's Contemplations, and 1996's The Gathering, the latter of which featured his wife, vocalist Joan Beal. Rounder issued his 1997 LP Alternate Route. Recorded with the Metropole Orchestra, his Red Shift: Concerto for Orchestra was released by Koch in 1998. After Beal relocated to Los Angeles, his skills at writing accessible orchestral compositions that allowed room for improvisation found him more steady film and television work, and he landed Ed Harris' directorial debut, Pollock, in 2001. Highlights of his subsequent film work that decade included Harris' Appaloosa, the William H. Macy romantic comedy The Deal, and a handful of Tom Selleck made-for-TV Jesse Stone mysteries. In the meantime, he won Emmys for his theme to TV's Monk and for his work on the 2006 Stephen King mini-series Nightmares & Dreamscapes. The following decade brought more entries in the Jesse Stone franchise, documentaries such as 2017's Boston and An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, and work on the hit Netflix series House of Cards (2013 to 2018). His suspenseful mix of jazz and classical music for the show received season-by-season soundtrack releases by Varèse Sarabande, and in 2018, BIS issued his House of Cards Symphony featuring the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra. Meanwhile, Beal's film credits included such projects as the documentary The Biggest Little Farm (2018) and the basketball drama Inside Game (2019). In 2020, Notefornote released Beal's score for the documentary Jay Sebring: Cutting to the Truth, following it a year later with his soundtrack for the comedy Breaking News in Yuba County. Another documentary, 2022's GameStop: Rise of the Players, featured a Beal score, and in 2024, he released The New York Études. A home-recorded set of ten solo piano études, the latter album was inspired by his relocation to New York City three years prior. ~ Steve Leggett & Marcy Donelson, Rovi