Alum Jack Allocco is a Rochester Music Hall of Fame 2019 Inductee
The Rochester Music Hall of Fame announced its Class of 2019 inductees and Nazareth alumnus Jack Allocco '72, 11-time Emmy® Award-winning composer and record producer, is among the prestigious group. He’s joined by:
- Al Jardine, founding member, guitarist and vocalist for the Beach Boys
- Christine Lavin, iconic folk singer and songwriter
- Jeffrey Springut, legendary music promoter and owner of Rochester’s legendary Red Creek music venue
- WCMF-FM 96.5, classic-rock radio station celebrating its 50th anniversary, plus long-time personality Dave Kane will be given the Rochester Music Hall of Fame’s Special Merit Award, for his 38th year on-the-air with the station.
Allocco will be in Rochester and will perform at the eighth annual induction ceremony of the Rochester Music Hall of Fame at 7 p.m. on Sunday, April 28 at Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre. Allocco and Prime Time Funk will accompany musician Gary Wright, who will perform his 1970s hits “Dream Weaver” and “Love Is Alive” — for which Allocco has written the current arrangements. They will be joined by the Nazareth College Symphony Orchestra. Tickets start at $31 and are on sale via rochestermusic.org or through the Eastman Theatre Box Office at eastmantheatre.org or (585) 274-3000.
The past seven ceremonies have drawn near sell-out crowds since first taking the Kodak Hall stage in 2012, celebrating the music of 44 inductees to date. The Rochester Music Hall of Fame celebrates and preserves the legacy of music made by Rochester natives or musicians who spent their formative years in Rochester. All profits from the ceremony and programs underwrite music education.
Jack Allocco is an 11-time Emmy® Award-winning composer, conductor, and songwriter whose career spans television, film, and theater. He is the composer for Sony Pictures Television’s The Young and the Restless and CBS Television’s The Bold and the Beautiful — the most watched daytime drama in the world, with a daily audience of 26.2 million viewers in 98 countries. For those two programs alone, it has been estimated that Allocco has scored more than 12,000 hours of network TV.
Allocco has won 13 consecutive ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards in the category of “Most Performed Themes and Underscore on Television,” and also has worked as a composer and producer for established music artists. He has toured as music director and conductor with numerous theatrical productions and symphonies, as well as performers Robert Goulet and Peter Allen, and has performed in concerts at Carnegie Hall, Buckingham Palace, The Grand Ole Opry, and The White House (including both inaugurations of Ronald Reagan). Among his compositions is a classical ballet for children titled “Animal Crackers.”
As a current trustee of Nazareth College and a proud alumnus (1972) — one of the first to receive Nazareth’s then-newly established music theory degree — Allocco was commissioned to compose and perform a piece for the inaugural concert at The Jane and Laurence Glazer Music Performance Center at Nazareth College in September 2018. “The education I received (at Nazareth) was in no small way the reason for why I have been a successful composer,” Allocco said.
Born and raised in Rochester, he began guitar lessons at age four and was pretty much self-taught until he met teacher Ray Shahin while at Bishop Kearney High School. “He taught me to sight-read all styles of music,” Allocco said. His mother was a Big Band singer and exposed him and his sister to all kinds of music at a young age. “Because of the weather in Rochester, I spent a lot of time indoors watching television and loved the music,” Allocco said. “I knew every main title and the names of all the composers.” He resides in Nashville with his wife, Stacie, and children Catherine and Nicholas. He also holds a bachelor’s degree from St. John Fisher College and has been granted Honorary Doctorate degrees from Nazareth College as well as Marymount University in Los Angeles.
For More Information
Julie Long | Chief PR Officer | 585-389-2456 or jlong2@naz.edu
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Alumnus Jack Allocco, '72, is a 2019 inductee in the Rochester Music Hall of Fame. He's shown here conducting the Nazareth College Symphony Orchestra at the Gala opening of the Glazer Music Performance Center in Sept. 2018.