Jason Cullimore was born in Regina, Saskatchewan. As a child Jason took six years of piano and organ performance lessons and played flute in his school band (after achieving the only perfect score ever earned in the school board’s aptitude test). His early interests included sciences as much as music and the arts, however, and he went on to earn his B.Sc. in Biology (with honors) from Queen’s University.
Jason had been teaching himself to compose throughout his Bachelor’s degree, and when he graduated, he was determined to work in a field more closely related to music. He received a scholarship to study Music Psychology under Lola Cuddy at Queen’s University, eventually producing a thesis exploring the cognitive representation of musical harmony. This research afforded Jason the opportunity to develop his score reading and composing skills, and part of the thesis actually involved rewriting a Mozart Piano Sonata for presentation to experiment participants. Jason was composing constantly throughout his Masters’ program, producing well-reviewed theatrical scores. To expand his understanding of music he took private lessons in theory and composition with composer and music professor Norman Sherman. These lessons, taken every two weeks for four years, provided Jason with an understanding of music theory, exposure to contemporary art music, and a foundation for refining his own compositional style. Upon graduating in 1999, Jason returned to Regina with the intention if working as a professional composer.
Since 1999, Jason has developed an extensive and varied library of original works. His concert works have been performed by the full Victoria Symphony, by the twelve-member Regina Symphony Chamber Players and by mixed groups combining orchestral instruments with jazz and electronic instrumentation. They have appeared on programs as diverse as new music festivals, concerts of film music and concerts devoted entirely to projects Jason has organized himself. Jason is a noted soundtrack composer, having been nominated for a Gemini and having won a Saskatchewan Motion Picture Industry Association award for his Thomas Tallis-influenced soundtrack to the film “Slatland”. He is in-demand as a theater composer and organizer, and his recent theatre scores have included live performances by a choral ensemble and a jazz-funk band. Jason has been recognized in songwriting competitions: his orchestral pieces have won prestigious finalist placings in both the Unisong and the UK International Songwriting Competitions (entered in the form of computer mock-ups). His work in other styles has also done well; he has previously won both a Grand Prize for Jazz and a Top-Four Finalist placing for Electronic Music in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest.