Kyle Brightwell earned his B.M. from The Juilliard School where he studied with Daniel Druckman and his M.M. from Boston University studying with Timothy Genis.

 

Kyle joined the percussion section of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in the fall of 2012, occupying the Peter Andrew Lurie Chair.  In addition to the BSO, he made his solo debut performing James MacMillan’s percussion concerto Veni, Veni, Emmanuel in March 2012.  Summer engagements have included fellowships at the Tanglewood Music Center, Pacific Music Festival, and National Orchestral Institute. In the summer of 2012 he joined the faculty of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute (BUTI), where he also spent three years as a high school student. Besides his performance career, Mr. Brightwell is also dedicated to community outreach through music. While living in New York City, he was a faculty member of the Juilliard School’s Music Advancement Program (MAP) for underprivileged inner city youth, and was also appointed a Fellow of the Gluck Community Service Fellowship (GCSF), for which he performed concerts throughout New York in homeless shelters, psychiatric wards, AIDS centers, and other venues in need of music. 

 

 

Percussionist Doug Perkins has been described as “terrific, wide-awake and strikingly entertaining” by the Boston Globe and he has been declared a “percussion virtuoso ” by the New York Times and has appeared at venues of many types throughout the world. His projects take him to tradition venues like Lincoln Center or Carnegie Hall but also less standard places like the middle of Central Park Lake or the Alaskan Tundra. He has commissioned and premiered nearly 100 pieces works and regularly with such composers as David Lang, Steve Reich, Paul Lansky, John Luther Adams, Christian Wolff, Nathan Davis, Larry Polansky, and Tristan Perich. He founded the percussion quartet So Percussion and the Meehan/ Perkins Duo. He also performs regularly with eighth blackbird and Signal.

 

Doug’s recordings as a soloist, conductor, producer, and member of the Meehan/ Perkins Duo, Signal, and So Percussion can be heard on the Bridge, Cantaloupe, Harmonia Mundi, New Focus, Physical Editions, and New World labels. Doug produced a recording of John Luther Adams' Inuksuit for Cantaloupe Music and it is been named one of the years best recordings by NPR, the New York Times, the New Yorker, the Boston Globe, Time Out New York, and many others.  

 

Doug’s large-scale productions of Iannis Xenakis’ Persephassa in and around Central Park Lake and John Luther Adams’ Inuksuit in New York City were named Top Ten Performances in 2010 and 2011 by the New Yorker, New York Magazine, and Time Out NY. He recently directed the premiere of John Luther Adams’, Sila: The Breath of the World at Lincoln Center Out of Doors.

 

Doug is the Director of the Chosen Vale International Percussion Seminar at the Center for Advanced Musical Studies, serves with eighth blackbird as an Artist-in-Residence at the University of Chicago, and previously served on the faculty of Dartmouth College. Doug received his Bachelor’s degree from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, Masters and Artist Diploma degrees from Yale University, and his Doctorate from Stony Brook University. He performs with Vic Firth sticks and mallets, Pearl/Adams drums and keyboards, Black Swamp Percussion accessories, Remo drumheads, and Zildjian cymbals.

 

 

www.szsolomon.com
ssolomon@bostonconservatory.edu

 

 

Samuel Z. Solomon earned his B.M. and M.M. from The Juilliard School and studied percussion with Gordon Gottlieb, Roland Kohloff, Daniel Druckman and Timothy Genis.

 

In addition to being coordinator of percussion studies at The Boston Conservatory, Solomon teaches at Boston University and the Boston University Tanglewood Institute and is president of the Massachusetts Chapter of the Percussive Arts Society. A fervent supporter of contemporary music, he has been responsible for dozens of world premieres of solo and small ensemble works and is author of How to Write for PERCUSSION, a comprehensive guide for composers on percussion composition that has received critical acclaim from composers, performers and conductors worldwide. He has also recently published three books on percussion performance and technique.

 

Solomon is a founding member of the Yesaroun’ Duo and the Line C3 percussion group, percussionists in residence at Harvard University and principal timpanist of the Amici New York Chamber Orchestra. He can be heard as a soloist and chamber musician on Albany, Tzadik and GM record labels, as well as performing the music of Björk on her soundtrack to Matthew Barney’s art film, Drawing Restraint 9. More information can be viewed atwww.szsolomon.com.

 

 

 

 

Nancy Zeltsman earned a B.M. in percussion from the New England Conservatory (NEC) where she studied with Vic Firth. Other important teachers were Robert Ayers, Ian Finkel and Dave Samuels. She was a fellow at Tanglewood Music Center in 1978.

 

Zeltsman is founder and artistic director of Zeltsman Marimba Festival, Inc. (2001–present; www.ZMF.us), and was co-founder of Marimolin, a violin/marimba duo (1985-1996, with Sharan Leventhal). Zeltsman has presented numerous marimba recitals and master classes throughout the U.S. and in Europe, Mexico and Japan. In 2005, she was one of two featured marimbists to perform Michael Tilson Thomas' Island Music with percussionists of the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) on three SFS subscription concerts at Davies Hall. Prior to that, she performed the work with percussionists of the New World Symphony in Miami and at Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall. Zeltsman premiered William Thomas McKinley's marimba concerto, Childhood Memories, with Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP) which has been released on CD. In addition, she has premiered more than 125 works for marimba solo and marimba within chamber music. Zeltsman was a jury member for the 2010 TROMP International Solo Percussion Competition, the 2003 International Marimba Competition for Students in Paris and the 2001 Belgium International Marimba Competition. She has recorded seven CDs—three CDs with Marimolin (Catalyst/BMG and GM Recordings), three solo marimba CDs and one duo marimba CD. Zeltsman has been broadcast on WGBH-Boston, WQXR-NY, WNYC, BBC-London and in Malmö, Sweden. She is the author of Four-Mallet Marimba Playing: A Musical Approach for All Levels (Hal Leonard Corporation), and was editor and project leader of Intermediate Masterworks for Marimba (2 volumes; C.F. Peters Corporation). Zeltsman endorses Marimba One marimbas and the "Nancy Zeltsman Series" of Encore Mallets. More information can be found at www.nancyzeltsman.com.

 

(Photo by Claudia Hansen)