ABOUT
Justin currently serves as Associate Principal Clarinet of Orchestra Victoria and is the founding Artistic Director of the Melbourne Chamber Players.
His performance career has taken him across Australia, New Zealand and Canada, appearing as guest Principal and E-flat Clarinet with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and the Australian World Orchestra. He has been heard on numerous live broadcasts for ABC and 3MBS radio, Radio New Zealand, Opera Europa and ABC Classics.
Justin has also contributed to a growing number of television soundtracks. He recorded on Bryony Marks’ score for ABC’s The Messenger and has also worked on the original scores for ABC’s The Newsreader and the forthcoming comedy Dog Park.
A committed chamber musician, Justin has collaborated with ensembles including the Orava Quartet, Flinders Quartet, Arcadia Winds, Hindemith Wind Quintet and the Melbourne Ensemble. He has performed at festivals such as Port Fairy, Peninsula Summer, Bendigo, Melbourne Festival, Music by the Springs, the Banff Summer Music Festival and the Mackay Chamber Music Festival.
Justin is deeply engaged in Australian contemporary music. He has commissioned a wide range of new works and performed extensively with award-winning ensembles including Syzygy, Arcko Symphonic Project, Opus House and the Rubiks Collective. His premieres include works by Margaret Sutherland, Deborah Cheetham, Nigel Sabin, Paul Dean, Brett Dean, Sam Smith, Gordon Kerry and Matthew Laing. He also leads the Continuo Commissioning Circle, a Victorian initiative supporting the creation and performance of new chamber music.
Recent highlights include his 2024 performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with Makoto Ozone at the Melbourne International Jazz Festival. A reviewer praised his contribution, noting his “beautifully shaped, evocative opening” to the work. His other notable performances include the premieres of Paul Dean’s E-flat Clarinet Concertino No Exit (2014) and Nigel Sabin’s Clarinet Quintet (2019), Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet with the Orava String Quartet (2018), and performing principal E-flat clarinet with the Australian World Orchestra under Zubin Mehta (2022). Another critic wrote of his playing:
“Justin Beere’s astounding breath control and range of dynamic in the third part, ‘Abyss of the Birds’, was riveting.”
A Fellow and alumnus of the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM), Justin has studied under leading clarinettists including David Thomas, Paul Dean, Stephen Kenyon and Floyd Williams. He has also performed in masterclasses with Andrew Marriner, Michael Collins, Paul Meyer, Dimitri Ashkenazy, Thorsten Johanns, James Campbell and Frank Celata. He holds a Bachelor of Music with Honours from the Queensland Conservatorium and completed postgraduate study at the University of Tasmania Conservatorium of Music on an orchestral woodwind scholarship. He later undertook ANAM’s Professional Performance Program while completing a Master of Music Research degree at the Queensland Conservatorium on a full scholarship. His awards include the Nelle Ashdown Memorial Award (2011) and the Robert and Elizabeth Albert Scholarship (2019).
As an educator, Justin has taught across Queensland and Victoria and has served as a Teaching Associate at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music and the Melbourne Conservatorium Young Artists Academy. He currently teaches at Camberwell Grammar School and runs a private studio in South Melbourne, where he enjoys working with the next generation of young clarinettists.
