Continued . . .
Among several noted composers who have dedicated works to John Rose is Malcolm Williamson, Master of the Queens Music to H.M. Elizabeth II of Great Britain. He has long been associated with the church music institute held each summer at Colby College in Maine, serving since 1988 as its director. He has been awarded a performance grant by the National Endowment for the Arts, and has received "Young Artist of the Year" honors from the national journal Musical America. He is an elected member of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences and an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in London.
John Rose is a graduate of Rutgers University, and was an instructor in organ at the university's Newark campus while cathedral organist there. His primary organ teacher was the late virtuoso Virgil Fox, with whom he studied privately for over seven years.
Critics have hailed his "consummate musicianship and masterly programming" (Melbourne, Australia), his "exceptional sympathy" with the composer (performing with the San Francisco Symphony), and his "animation and tasteful liberty" and "maturity of conception" (on recording). "Sparkling fireworks of technical and musical effects, brilliantly delivered by a gifted artist," commented an Oslo critic after John Rose made his debut in the Norwegian capital.