Jeff Reilly

Jeff Reilly is a musician with a broad and extensive scope of work. His approach to music blurs any simple distinctions between improvisation and composition, and he strives to do it with such integrity that we are reminded that these distinctions are moot.

A twice Juno-nominated bass clarinetist as well as a composer, conductor, improviser, and producer, Jeff has appeared as a soloist with the Elora Singers, Symphony Nova Scotia, the Winnipeg New Music Festival, Elmer Iseler Singers, I Musici de Montreal, the Canadian Chamber Choir, Calgary’s Luminous Voices, Ottawa’s 13 Strings and across Canada, USA, Europe and Asia in the groundbreaking trios Blackwood and Sanctuary.
In his 32-year career as a producer with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, he produced hundreds of concert recordings of classical, jazz, world and contemporary music, hundreds of studio sessions and over 25 CDs of Canadian jazz and classical music. Over the years 7 of his album productions have received Juno nominations.
Jeff has composed dozens of works for orchestra, big band, jazz composer’s orchestras, bass clarinet ensembles, choirs, cello duos, chamber jazz groups and for the ensemble Blackwood. His recent composition “Unfathomable Presence” for solo harp and orchestra was premiered by Ellen Gibling and Symphony Nova Scotia conducted by Karl Hirzer in January of 2024.