John McGrew

John McGrew is a composer, singer, multi-instrumentalist and performer currently residing in Brooklyn, NY.



Born in Ohio in 1980, McGrew was raised in a family of musicians, surrounded by madrigals, operas, and hand-built harpsichords. He studied piano and trumpet formally throughout elementary and high school, and while studying theater at the University of North Carolina, began to write electronic and rock compositions. Upon graduation, McGrew hauled his keyboard and trumpet north to New York City and started a band, John McGrew & The Sitbacks.



McGrew's desire to compose lyrical and textured melodies soon extended beyond his work with the Sitbacks to compositions for theater and dance. In 2008, McGrew composed music for the Hunter College High School production of Shakespeare's Two Noble Kinsmen, later collected on the album Bells and Bones. The New York Times called McGrew's music for the Jack Ferver dance performance piece Death Is Certain both "ominous" and "delicate." His musical based on the Cupid & Psyche with lyrics by Jon Karpinos was the central piece for youth performers at the Acting Manitou performing arts camp in Maine in 2009, where McGrew acts as musical director. In 2009, McGrew was invited to create and perform a piece for DanSpace Project's Food For Thought, a night that honored the year's most influential artists from the dance world.



McGrew pioneered an interactive, multimedia course entitled "Igniting the Creative Process" which he has been teaching both publicly and privately over the past four years.



McGrew currently performs across the country with his Brooklyn-based rock group Apollo Run, whose "talent for quickly jelling melodies" was recognized by NPR's Song of the Day, among others, including Time Out NY, Crawdaddy!, LAist.com, and FutureSounds.com. Apollo Run will be releasing their debut EP, Here Be Dragons, Vol. I, in October of 2010.