On February 9, 2022, Jonathan Besser passed away in Auckland Hospital, sparing him from the debilitating challenges of Motor Neuron Disease.

A composer and piano player, Jonathan was brought up in and around New York city where he studied music composition at the Mannes College of Music with David Loeb. He emigrated to New Zealand in 1974, where he has since been an active part of the local music scene performing regularly in festivals, touring extensively, and recording many albums across a range or musical styles.

He released five albums on Rattle beginning with Turn (2005), which featured some of his frequent collaborators, Nigel Gavin (guitar), Miranda Adams (violin), Tatiana Lanchtchikova (accordion), and Peter Scott (bass). Six years later he released Campursari (2011), which focused on the meditative qualities of Javanese gamelan as the starting point for an album of great textural and harmonic beauty.

In 2020, Rattle released a remastered compilation of the music he and Ross Harris created as the electronic music duo Free Radicals in the early 80s. We then released Cathedral, a reshaped version of a one-off improvised performance between Jonathan (playing the St Paul's Cathedral pipe organ in Dunedin) and Greg Fox (guitars and loops) on election night in 1984. Finally, in September, we released Besser String Quartets, a complete collection of Jonathan's quartets performed by Jade String Quartet, Miranda Adams (violin), William Hanfling (violin), Rob Ashworth (viola) and Edith Salzmann (cello).

An album of a selection of duos Jonathan wrote for Miranda Adams and Rob Ashworth is currently in production, but producer Don McGlashan is arranging the works for a slightly larger ensemble that will include tuned and untuned percussion. The project will be a celebration of Jonathan's unique voice and will ensure that his music continues to have a place within New Zealand's musical heritage.

Those who knew Jonathan would surely agree that his irrepressible creative spirit was equalled if not eclipsed by his enthusiasm for making music with collaborative colleagues. He was a gentle soul who enjoyed and saw the best in people, which made him incredibly easy to love. Whether one was convinced by his ideas or not, his sincerity and conviction were infectious, compelling one to go with him on many an extra mile to find the most beautiful articulation of the music he sought to create.

Where most composers seek as close and exact an interpretation of their scores as possible, Jonathan left space for the artistic and creative sensibilities of others. He was fond of improvisation and collaborative exploration, so a big part of his creative process was to actively leave room for others, a characteristic that one recognised in Jonathan the person as well as Jonathan the musician.

I will miss Jonathan’s humility and sincerity, his boundless creative spirit and enthusiasm for people, and the enormous pleasure he took in creating music. Farewell Jonathan. Now you are free to take your place among the music of the spheres.

Steve Garden, February 14, 2022