Bio
Peter Chatterjee is a Bay Area-based composer, arranger, and conductor. Currently he is a doctoral candidate in music composition and theory at UC Davis, where he is researching pedagogical approaches to music theory and composing an opera on the interactions of identity, power, and corruption. Peter is also a Master’s student in conducting, studying choral techniques with Nicolas Alberto Dosman and orchestral conducting with Christian Baldini. He has studied with composers across the United States in classical, jazz, and commercial music, including Marti Epstein, Kurt Rohde, Pablo Ortiz, Liviu Marinescu, Bob Pilkington, Ayn Inserto, Greg Hopkins. He holds a Bachelor’s of Music in jazz composition and film scoring, and graduated summa cum laude from Berklee College of Music. He also earned his Master’s degree in composition with distinction at California State University, Northridge.
As a composer and arranger Peter has written for an array of large and small ensembles and across a wide range of musical genres. His music has been performed by artists and ensembles including the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Ghost Ensemble, Chris Froh, Empyrean Ensemble, UC Davis Sinfonietta, Mojave Trio, the Pacific Chamber Orchestra, Magela Herrera Quartet, and the Esterhazy Quartet. In the time since, he has focused on chamber, orchestral, electronic music, while experimenting with new music for large jazz ensemble that will be coming out in the near future. His recent work has featured explorations of the ways that mental health experiences can be explored through music, with When…Lost, workshopped by the SFCMP this past January exploring the ways in which memory reacts to trauma, and Morning is the Place for Dew being written as a reaction to California’s climatically exacerbated cycle of fire, torrential rain, and regrowth, premiered by the UC Davis Chamber Singers. He is currently working on an opera based around the turbulent interactions between three archetypal kings as they attempt to piece together their identities and relationships with one another having lost their memories and identities.
As a conductor he has worked in both studio sessions and live performance. At Berklee, he was extremely active as a studio conductor for film-scoring sessions, large jazz ensembles, and contemporary chamber music, including the premier of a brass quintet in the Berklee Performance Center. Since starting the M.A. program at UC Davis, he has focused heavily on choral techniques, serving as assistant conductor of both the Concert Choir and the Chamber Singers, leading both ensembles in performances over the past few years. This work continued during a 2024 UC Davis choral tour of Vienna and Salzburg. He has also worked closely with the UCD Symphony Orchestra and Sinfonietta, including presenting premiere performances of graduate works. Alongside this, he founded and directs the Undergraduate Reading Ensemble at UC Davis, which provides recording sessions for undergraduate composers each year, as well as conducting for the annual Undergraduate Composers’ Concert. Outside of UC Davis, he is also the director of the choir and adult orchestra at the Walnut Creek Center for Community Arts.
In addition to his activities as a composer and conductor, Peter is active in music education. His dissertation work is focused on approaches to modernization in music theory pedagogy, with emphasis on the ways in which theory and analysis interact in the presentation of theory concepts through musical examples. He is also an active private teacher and tutor, with experience teaching theory, counterpoint, composition, jazz theory, and arranging. He works as a Teaching Artist at the Walnut Creek Center for Community Arts, teaching ukulele, music theory, songwriting, and jazz theory in addition to his ensembles.