Darren W. Jenkins is an award-winning composer whose compositions have been performed and recorded both nationally and internationally. His first work for band, Variations on A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, won the 1989 Claude T. Smith Memorial Band Composition Contest. With well over 100 works to his credit, Mr. Jenkins has composed and arranged for symphonic band, jazz band, marching band, orchestra, choir, chamber ensemble, and solo instruments.

Mr. Jenkins holds a Bachelor of Music degree in music education from Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas, and a Master of Music degree in composition from the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas. He has studied jazz composition and arranging with Frank Mantooth and did the majority of his graduate studies in composition with the eminent and prolific composer James Barnes. Active as a guest conductor, clinician, and adjudicator throughout the United States, Mr. Jenkins is currently the assistant director of bands at Olathe South High School in Olathe, Kansas.