Darin Atwater
- Conductor
- Composer
- Piano


About Darin
Founder & Artistic Director: Soulful Symphony United Nations Cultural Ambassador Artistic Director: Monterey Jazz Festival 2024
Darin Atwater is a visionary composer, conductor, and pianist whose work redefines the boundaries of American music. Known for fusing classical, jazz, gospel, soul, and hip-hop into expansive symphonic forms, he has been called “a musical genius that closes the chasm between genres” (Washington Examiner). His compositions reflect a commitment to cultural truth, spiritual depth, and sonic innovation.
As founder of Soulful Symphony, Atwater has reshaped orchestral tradition through groundbreaking concerts and Emmy-winning broadcasts. He was Composer-in-Residence with the Baltimore Symphony. His commissioned works with the Philadelphia Orchestra—South Side: Symphonic Dances and Black Metropolis: A Ballad Opera—blend orchestral complexity with Black cultural narratives and have been praised for their emotional power and musical specificity.
He has led performances at the Kennedy Center, the Smithsonian, Lincoln Center and across the globe, collaborating with major orchestras and artists such as Wynton Marsalis, Ledisi, Wyclef Jean, Kathleen Battle and Soloman Howard.
In 2023, Atwater served as Artistic Director of the Monterey Jazz Festival. His creative leadership—infused with narrative coherence, cultural depth, and artist-centered thinking—recharged Monterey Jazz’s identity and solidified his reputation as a visionary curator, cultural strategist, and brand architect who honors legacy while defining the future.
Internationally, he co-leads Elevating Voices within the African Borderlands, a cultural initiative with the United Nations. Domestically, he is Distinguished Faculty at The Johns Hopkins Peabody Institute, where he co-launched the conservatory’s American Roots Division.
Representation
General Management with Askonas Holt
Photos
News
Press
Monterey Jazz Festival names new artistic director
Sep 2023“Darin is a visionary leader who brings to MJF a strong artistic vision, a commitment to artistic excellence and a proven track record of success in building audiences across diverse communities,” said festival Executive Director Colleen Bailey. Ken Gordon, chair of the festival’s board of directors, added that Atwater “has a unique understanding of the rich history of jazz as well as its cultural significance in the present day. He is poised and ready to lead us into the future.”
- San Francisco
- 12 September 2023
Philadelphia Orchestra premieres gorgeous new score by Darin Atwater at the Mann
Jul 2018Like the best movie music, Atwater is able to light emotion with great specificity — and power. The opening movement, “West Side (Prologue),” could nearly stand on its own as a concert overture for all of the dramatic ground it covers. In a few very minutes, it manages to straddle a nuanced realm occupied by beauty, seriousness, and dignity while delivering the sense of some important message.
- The Philadelphia Inquirer
- 19 July 2018