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Jean Rudy Perrault

Performer, conductor and composer, Jean (Rudy) Perrault is Director of Orchestras and Professor of Music at the University of Minnesota Duluth (UMD). Rudy coaches chamber music, conducts both the Symphony and Chamber Orchestras, teaches violin and viola, the Graduate literature classes and the Graduate Conducting classes.

Born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Jean “Ruby” Perrault earned his Master’s degree in violin performance from Temple University, under the tutelage of Helen Kwalwasser. Upon graduation, he moved to the New York area and became assistant conductor of the New York Symphonic Arts Ensemble while maintaining his post as principal guest conductor of the Holy Trinity Philharmonic Orchestra. Since then, Perrault has guest conducted numerous ensembles in France, Sweden, Russia, Haiti, Brazil, Italy, and Turkey. He is a frequent panelist on national and international, instrumental and conducting competitions, and has participated in many music festivals. As an educator, he has conducted master classes and pedagogical workshops in many countries, including Venezuela where he worked closely with members of “El Sistema” organization (FESNOJIV).

His most recent compositions include: Nostalgia, a string trio celebrating Jean-Baptiste Pointe du Sable, founder of modern-day Chicago; Z.O.E. a string quartet that served as the soundtrack for a documentary on Zombie Origin and Evolution, Still Around, a setting of the poem by the same name by Ruth Bauemler-Schmidt, Brother Malcolm - for cello and piano (a fictitious conversation between Malcolm X and Martin Luther King on the inauguration of Barack Obama as 44th President of the United States), Exodus for String Quartet, (recorded by multiple ensembles, including the Borromeo String Quartet).

Future projects include composing a duo for violin and cello (Dialogues for Violin and Cello), a ballet on a Haitian theme (Cérémonies), and setting to music three poems by Edwidge Danticat. The past several years he has been editing and orchestrating the piano works of Haitian Classical Composers.