There are multiple artists with this name. Following are listed in order of prominence. (1) John Coolidge Adams (born February 15, 1947) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer with strong roots in minimalism. He learned the clarinet from his father and played in marching bands and community orchestras during his formative years. He began composing at the age of ten and heard his first orchestral pieces performed while still a teenager. The intellectual and artistic traditions of New England, especially the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Harvard University, helped shape him as an artist and thinker. After earning two degrees from Harvard University, he moved to Northern California in 1971 and has ever since lived in the San Francisco Bay area. Adams taught for ten years at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music before becoming Composer in Residence with the San Francisco Symphony (1982-85) and the creator of the orchestra's highly successful and controversial “New and Unusual Music" series. Several of Adams’s landmark orchestral works were written for and premiered by the San Francisco Symphony, including Harmonium (1981), Grand Pianola Music (1982), Harmonielehre (1985) and El Dorado (1992). His well-known operas include 'Nixon in China' (1987), which recounts Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China 1972, and 'Doctor Atomic' (2005), which covers Robert Oppenheimer, the Manhattan Project, and the building of the first atomic bomb. John Adams' music is published by Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishing, www.boosey.com/adams. Adams' official site is www.earbox.com. --------------------------------------------- (2) John Adams is a Dallas-based jazz bassist and band-leader. --------------------------------------------- (3) John Adams, Dutch country singer who gained international popularity from 1988 onwards, after winning the televized talent show 'Henny Huisman's Soundmix Show'. --------------------------------------------- (4) John Adams is a Trombonist with old swan band. --------------------------------------------- (5) John Adams is a Welsh singer-songwriter. He went on to appear on the 2012 X Factor as a Maths Teacher, where he made it through to the last 12 boys. His audition was featured heavily and his rendition of Cannonball by Damien Rice received a huge response from both judges and audience.Being on the show kicked started his career. "The Pavement Is My Stage" his first album, has been recently released on Sep 25th, 2013 Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.