Joe Elefante has traveled 4 continents as a pianist, saxophonist, vocalist, composer, arranger, and bandleader. He has musically directed, conducted or played countless musical theater productions, including several at the Paper Mill Playhouse and Jersey Boys on Broadway and National Tour.

 

Joe founded the Joe Elefante Big Band in 2001, which was the house band at Cecil's Jazz Club for three years, and was featured on ABC's Nightline and in the Wall Street Journal.  He was named a Jazz Ambassador by the Kennedy Center, and has toured Eastern Europe and the Middle East as a jazz pianist for the U.S. State Department.  He has also been selected to the prestigious BMI Jazz Composers Workshop in NYC and the Betty Carter: Jazz Ahead program at the Kennedy Center.

 

Joe has composed and/or arranged over 80 compositions for jazz ensemble, 50 compositions for chorus, and several works for orchestra, wind ensemble and chamber groups. His choral music has received international acclaim. City of Ships (text by Walt Whitman), for SATB choir, won the 2018 Manhattan Choral Ensemble New Music for New Music Commissioning Competition. Praise the Lord, for He Is Loving (based on Psalm 134), for SATB choir, organ, string quartet, flute, and percussion, won 2nd prize in the 2019 Notre Dame Folk Choir Liturgy Alive Choir Composition Competition. The Beauty of Cosmic Things (text by Alan Seeger), for SATB Choir, violin, cello, and piano, won 2nd prize in the 2019 Murau International Music Festival Call for Scores. Fluminis (based on Psalm 46), for SSATBB choir, received an honorable mention in the 2019 Siena College Choral Composition Competition. Additionally, two of his compositions for jazz ensemble, Hollywood and Vine and Preach It!, are published by C.L. Barnhouse.

 

Joe has a B.Mus. in Music Performance from New Jersey City University, an M.A. in Educational Leadership from Montclair State University, and is pursuing a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership Policy from Texas Tech University. Currently, he is a freelance composer, arranger, and performer, Artistic Director of the 80-voice Celebration Singers adult choir, and Fine & Performing Arts Supervisor for the Rahway Public Schools in NJ.