Peter Aglinskas earned a Master of Music degree in Composition from Northwestern University, where he won the Honor’s Concert Award for his orchestral work Karnyzas Paneling, and a Bachelor of Music degree in Composition from De Paul University.
Having composed, produced, and recorded music ranging from symphonic and operatic to rock and funk, Peter Aglinskas has written many scores for theater and was nominated twice for the Joseph Jefferson Award in the category of Best Original Musical Score. He has been a composer and guitarist in such notable and stylistically diverse Chicago musical ensembles as The Loop Group, David Hernandez and Street Sounds, Kapture, and Funk Bunker. Recipient of the Chicago Cultural Department’s “Artists International” Award, Peter Aglinskas has been delighting audiences for more than two decades with his signature blend of popular, classical, and world music influences.
Peter is an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Music at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois, where he teaches Music Appreciation, classical guitar and jazz guitar, and a course which he created entitled Crime Jazz—an exploration of jazz music’s impact on mid-20th Century American detective films and T.V. shows, where the smoky moods and violent images of the criminal underworld were fused with the rhythmic drive and sensuality of jazz. For the past two years, he has also been teaching a course for Continuing Education which he created entitled Seven Nights of Noir, in which seven iconic movies representing distinct themes and eras of film noir are viewed, analyzed, and discussed utilizing Peter’s original multi-media presentations.
Peter is also an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Performing Arts at Indiana University Northwest in Gary, Indiana, where he teaches Rock Music History, Music For The Listener, and a course which he created entitled The Soundscape of Pulp Fiction—which explores the use of music in the films of modern crime drama masters Quentin Tarentino and the Coen brothers, as well as the works of classic B&W film noir directors.
In January 2019, Peter began the fifth season of his film/lecture series at the Brauer Museum of Art on the campus of Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Indiana entitled Thursday Night Noir, based on his lecture series The Noir Style in Image, Word and Sound—a multi-disciplinary study of Noir’s influence on mid-20th Century American film, art, photography, literature, radio drama, and music.
In 2014, Peter was included in The Art Career Project’s list of “15 Noteworthy Art Professors in Chicago.” This prestigious organization recognizes and highlights the work of some of the best professors in various major metropolitan areas.
In addition to teaching, Peter maintains a busy concert schedule performing at museums, outdoor music festivals, arboretums, libraries and colleges. Peter has two commercially released solo guitar CDs to his credit—South Shore Soul (2008), featuring his original solo guitar arrangements of soul music from Chicago and The Region, and Sepia Session (2006), featuring his original solo guitar arrangements of jazz and pop gems with an Afro-Latin spin. Hear audio clips from South Shore Soul and Sepia Session by visiting www.cdbaby.com/cd/aglinskas