Giacomo Oliva

Dean › Hixson-Lied College of Fine & Performing Arts

University of Nebraska-Lincoln • 102 WAB • Lincoln NE, 68588-0144 • 402.472.9339 • goliva2@unl.edu

Giacomo M. "Jack" Oliva, professor of music and dean of the Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts at UNL, has also served as director of the School of Music at the University of Florida, as head of the department of music at Mississippi State University, as director of music for the Leonia (N.J.) Public Schools, and as an instrumental and vocal music teacher in several New Jersey school districts.

He has presented papers and lecture recitals for International Society for Music Education, the College Music Society, MENC, the Australian Society for Music Education, the Association of Teacher Educators, and the Music Teachers National Association. Oliva had a two-year term as president of the International Society for Music Education.

He maintains a special interest in Ragtime and other forms of American popular music, and regularly presents recitals and lectures on piano rags. His activities as a pianist and conductor also include several years as musical director and accompanist for singer Connie Francis.

His early music studies were as a piano student of Isabella Byman and as a scholarship student with Seymour Bernstein, Stefan Volpe, Jan Gorbaty and Augusta Scheiber at the Chatham Square Music School in New York City. He holds degrees from Montclair State University (BA cum laude, MA) and from New York University (Ed.D), with additional study in administration and curriculum at Seton Hall University.

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