Ron Jones Luncheon – May 19, 2010

It was a lively and informative luncheon, as we learned about one of the most prolific composers working today.

Composer, Arranger, Conductor, Ron Jones has had an amazingly diverse career. Most of his creative work has involved scoring music for TV and Film projects, produced by both major Hollywood studios and independent production companies. He has written for an amazing array of series including: Hundreds of episodes of Hanna-Barbera’s popular animated series such as Smurfs, Scooby-Doo, The Snorks and many more.

With Mike Post and Pete Carpenter he wrote for The A-Team,  Magnum P.I.,  Hardcastle and McCormick, Riptide,  Hunter and more. For Disney he wrote for the Duck Tales series, then on to Paramount for Star Trek: The Next Generation. He also began scoring video games at this time with scores for both StarFleet Academy and StarFleet Command, being the first games to use a full studio orchestra. StarFleet Academy won the best score award from the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences.

Later came the theme for Fairly Oddparents and then on to score the Family Guy and American Dad series, which has pushed him to compose in virtually every style.

Currently, Ron has expanded his musical exploration by forming the “INFLUENCE JAZZ ORCHESTRA.” The group is made up of the most elite session and jazz players in Los Angeles. This ensemble was formed out of a desire to share with live audiences the incredible and amazing studio musicians Ron calls to record his TV scores. “INFLUENCE” has performed at many of the top Jazz Clubs and concert venues to sold out audiences. The band performs new works by Ron, as well as the best charts written for Jazz Ensemble. Many performances feature Seth MacFarlane of Family Guy, singing his favorite classic Sinatra songs as arrangements by Nelson Riddle, Billy May and more.

Ron’s Influence Jazz Orchestra also expands to a 60 piece symphony which performs an ecclectic mix of film scores, broadway charts and everything in between.

“I founded and lead the rebel underground Ravel Orchestral Study Group that meets at Vitello’s. We study in depth the orchestral works and creative process of Ravel. We typically have about 75 composers and arrangers at each study.”

Ron is very interested in teaching and sharing his professional insights with the new generation of composers.