The son of a Methodist minister, Premru was born in Elmira, New York and grew up in the Finger Lakes region south of Rochester.

Premru’s compositional output runs from jazz arrangements to choral works, and includes pieces commissioned by numerous leading orchestras, festivals and organizations.

[1] In a 1981 interview with Capital Radio, he cited as influences the music of Berg, Prokofiev, Bartók and Ives, in addition to jazz and early Bach studies.

Throughout his career his language remained one of relatively conservative mid-century modernism, with a bent toward gentle lyricism; though he wrote some works in a lighter vein, and jazz idioms and techniques pop up in even his most “serious” scores.

Most were commissioned and premiered by major ensembles (the symphonies by the Philharmonia and Cleveland orchestras, with conductors Lorin Maazel and Vladimir Ashkenazy, respectively); however none have been commercially recorded as of 2007 and only the Trumpet and Tuba concertos remain in print (also as of 2007).