Jari A. Villanueva arranger

Jari A. Villanueva is an American composer, conductor, music pedagogue, flugelhorn and trumpet player.

Villanueva studied music at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore and at the State University of Kent (KSU), in Kent, Ohio. He was a music teacher in Baltimore, Maryland and at Goucher College and Loyola College. As a trumpet player he was a member of several orchestras, such as the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Annapolis Symphony Orchestra, the orchestra of the Baltimore Opera Company, and as a soloist he performed a large number of wedding ceremonies. As a conductor he has worked for the Dundalk Community Theater, Catonsville Summer Theater, the Young Victorian Theater and The Peabody Ragtime Ensemble.

He is a member and Master Sergeant of the United States Air Force Band at the Bolling Air Force Base in Washington, D.C.. He is known in the United States as a historian of "signals" for bugle in American armed forces since the civil war. During President John F. Kennedy's funeral from Smithsonian to the Arlington National Cemetery, he played the signals on the bugle. From 1999 to 2002 he was curator of the Taps Bugle Exhibition at the Arlington National Cemetery.

Since 1998 he has been professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) and conductor of the Down and Dirty Dog Band (The UMBC Pep Band), The UMBC Jazz Ensemble-Big Band and The UMBC Concert Band. Villanueva is co-founder of The Federal City Brass Band, which exceptionally plays on 19th century instruments.

As a composer he has written music for wind orchestra, brass band, brass ensemble and brass quintet.