Amos’ music has been heard on WFMT in Chicago, WQXR in New York City and PBS. His music spans a wide range of genres including chamber and orchestra concert music, jazz, as well as music for film, theater and dance. His music has been commissioned and performed by the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Atlantic Music Festival Contemporary Ensemble, Third Millennium Ensemble, Eclipse Theater, Barkada Saxophone Quartet, Chicago Q Ensemble, Access Contemporary Music (ACM) and the Chicago Composers Orchestra among many others.
Amos’ music has been heard at various venues and Festivals around the world including The Ear Taxi Festival, Preston Bradley Hall Sunday Salon Series, Atlantic Music Festival, Illinois Musicians Festival at Grant Park, North American Saxophone Alliance Conference, Old Synagogue chamber music series in Mainz Germany, An Die Musik in Baltimore MD, Music Institute of Chicago, Court Theatre and the Green Mill among others.
Amos has received special recognition and finalist awards from ASCAP, League of Composers (ISCM), American Prize, Columbia Orchestra, the Macarthur Foundation and the Illinois Arts Council, and has won numerous grants including the 2013 and 2016 IAS professional development grant through the Illinois Arts Council, a Lucerne fellowship through the Chicago sister cities program and the Swiss benevolent society, as well as the 2008 Evanston Cultural Arts Grant and several Chicago Community Arts Assistance Program Grants (CAAP).
In October of 2018 on the Centaur label, Amos released “Solo!,” the Chamber Music of Amos Gillespie. He is currently working on a concert length jazz work titled “Unstructured Time”, about capturing childhood focus, creativity and peace through unstructured time. The piece will be mostly through-composed with moments of improv.
As a saxophonist Amos has performed with New Millennium Orchestra, Access Contemporary Music (ACM), Hard Art Groop, Chicago Composers Forum, MAVerick ensemble, Lakeshore Rush Ensemble, Gillespie Chamber Quartet, VOX 3 Vocal Collective, Hiz Film Studio Productions and the Alvarez Orchestra among others.
Amos has taught music theory at Chicago State University and the Peoples Music School in Chicago. He’s currently an adjunct lecturer teaching Music Theory, Ear Training and Music Appreciation at the University of Illinois Chicago, and substitute teaches at Chi-Arts, Chicago’s Fine Arts High School. He has served on the board with New Music Chicago for three years and is an active contributing member with Access Contemporary Music. He received a Master’s degree in composition from the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University and a Bachelor’s degree in Saxophone performance from Northern Arizona University.