Artists

Mike Fansler is Director of Bands and conductor of the wind ensemble and chamber winds at Western Illinois University, where he also leads the graduate wind conducting program and teaches undergraduate music education courses. He joined the faculty in 2001 and is currently Professor of Music.

The Canadian-American duo of flutist Zara Lawler and marimbist Paul J. Fadoul, hailed as “a great treat” (Classical WETA, Washington DC), offers audiences an unexpected mélange of classical virtuosity, lively commentary, theatrical flair, and a dose of indie rock sensibility. The duo’s repertoire ranges from delightful arrangements of classics to newly written pieces for their unusual instrumentation. Their debut album, Prelude Cocktail, was called “collaborative artistry at its finest” by I Care If You Listen. Recent highlights include a residency in Western Massachusetts as part of Chamber Music America’s Residency Partnership Program, tours of West Virginia, Michigan, and Ohio, and a New York appearance at Mannes School of Music’s Glassbox Performance Space. In 2016, Lawler + Fadoul incubated and premiered their theatrical concert, Clickable: The Art of Persuasion, at the cell theatre in New York City. Clickable has been performed across the United States.

A long-time advocate of new music, F. Gerard Errante has enjoyed a performance and recording career spanning decades.  A native New Yorker (Brooklyn), he began his music career like so many do – in a public school music program.  His love for music and his aptitude for woodwinds drove his pursuit of music all the way to college.  Most of his family had advanced careers in medicine; Gerry’s calling was music.  He became a dedicated student and scholar of music first at Queens College (BA), then at Wisconsin, (MA).  He did his doctoral work at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), and completed his DMA there in 1970.

Turkish composer Hakki Cengiz Eren’s (b. 1984) music has been performed across the United States and Europe. Recent performances of his music have been given by renowned soloists and ensembles, including Garth Knox, Calvin Wiersma, Mak Grgic, members of ECCE (Diamanda Dramm, Paolo Vignoroli, Vasko Dukovski and Virginie Tarrête), Argus Quartet, Ensemble Nodus and the Thornton Edge.

The Boston University Wind Ensemble is the premiere wind band of the Boston University School of Music. Under the baton of Professor David J. Martins, the Wind Ensemble is designed to prepare wind, brass, and percussion players for the professional world, and provide future teachers with concepts related to the study of band repertoire. The ensemble, made up of undergraduate and graduate level music majors, has participated in collaborations with composers and other universities, resulting in several world premieres.

Reigakusha was established in 1985 as an ensemble of professional gagaku instrumentalists dedicated to the study and performance of the classical gagaku repertoire and the creation of new music for ancient instruments. Led by the distinguished musician and composer Sukeyasu Shiba–a specialist in music for the ryuteki flute and biwa, and a former member of the Music Department of the Imperial Household Agency–Reigakusha has around thirty members.

The Sonic Arts Ensemble, founded by Marc Ainger and Ann Stimson (with Federico Cámara Halac as occasional co-director for this recording), is interested in sound and music as a multi-modal, embodied phenomenon. Their repertoire ranges from composed, notated scores to freely-structured co-improvisations. During the pandemic, the ensemble became a truly international group, leveraging the online environment to contribute to the emergent medium of networked performance, with members and guests joining together from the United States, Argentina, and Austria. Using software such as Jacktrip (Chris Chafe et al), and the elegantly titled Netty McNetFace (Puckette), the ensemble created audio networks using low-latency, high quality, uncompressed audio, facilitating real-time collaboration over “a long, thin wire” (hat tip to composer Alvin Lucier). The tracks here represent the ensemble’s live performances across the internet during this time.

Ergon is an Athens based contemporary music ensemble created in 2008 for performing works by living composers as well as masterpieces of the 20th and 21st-century avant-garde. Noted for its exciting interpretations and meticulous preparation, it has received praise from critics and audiences alike, making it the leading ensemble of its kind in Greece. An extremely flexible and versatile ensemble, Ergon is based on a core formation that is further reinforced, depending on the project, by a great number of guests and exceptionally talented musicians. Directed by a five-member musician team, responsible for planning, and collaborations, its original and adventurous programming includes chamber and orchestral music, musical theatre works, dance, contemporary opera, and cinema.

Hailed by the Columbia Daily Tribune as adding a “fresh dimension” to the concert experience, Khemia Ensemble is dedicated to reflecting broader perspectives in contemporary classical chamber music. With its dynamic instrumentation (soprano, flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano, two percussion), Khemia’s unique sound world encompasses the presentation of new classical music with a mix of acoustic chamber works, multimedia, and multi-genre influences.

On the verge of composed and improvised music, Whim Ensemble (Ofer Pelz, prepared piano, Preston Beebe, percussion and since 2021 Stéphane Diamantakiou, double bass) creates percussive landscapes by inventing instrument modifications and techniques to build an unusually rich sound world since 2015. They place found objects on their instruments to explore complex timbres, textures, and harmonies. Inspired by electroacoustic music, they generate sound through motion to create musical gestures which resonate to sound as one.

Amos Elkana was born in Boston, but grew up in Jerusalem. At the age of 15, he picked up the electric guitar and began to study music, which soon became his primary occupation in life. In 1987, aged 20, he returned to Boston to study jazz guitar at the Berklee College of Music and composition at The New England Conservatory of Music. In 1990, he moved to Paris where he studied composition with Michele Reverdy. He also took composition classes with Erik Norby in Copenhagen, and with Paul-Heinz Dittrich and Edison Denisov in Berlin. Two years later he returned to Israel where he has been living since. In 2007 Elkana received his M.F.A. in music/sound from Bard College, New York. While at Bard, he focused on electronic music and took lessons with Pauline Oliveros, David Behrman, Richard Teitelbaum, George Lewis, Maryanne Amacher and Larry Polansky, among others.

A poet who composes. Refines Chinese ancient essence, which combines with western civilization. Also a writer for film, TV and others, right now looking for someone to mediate.

Robert Dusek received his academic training at the Eastman School of Music, Southern Methodist University, and the University of Colorado – Boulder, where he received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in 1990. He is the recipient of numerous awards and honors in the field of composition, including Columbia University's Bearns Prize, the ASCAP Raymond-Hubbard Award, an A.H.A.B – Neodata Fellowship for his Symphony No. 1, and several national and local awards and grants. His music has been performed worldwide and recorded by such groups as North-South Consonance and the Warsaw Philharmonic. Dusek is the Founder/Director of DaCapo LLC, an organization devoted to the pursuit and development of artistic and compositional endeavors.

Canadian musicians Allen Harrington, saxophone and Laura Loewen, piano, established the Harrington/Loewen Duo in 2002. Praised for their musicality, tight ensemble, and virtuosic performances, the Harrington/Loewen Duo has performed throughout North America, and in Europe, Asia, and South America. Recipients of grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Manitoba Arts Council, they are committed to exploring the standard repertoire and actively commissioning new works. Allen is in high demand as a soloist, adjudicator, chamber and orchestra musician on both saxophone and bassoon.

The McCormick Duo is a classical duo of flute and percussion music consisting of flutist Kim McCormick and percussionist Robert McCormick. They have worked together for nearly 25 years performing concerts on recital series university venues and scholarly music conferences.

Praised by The Strad magazine for their "wit and imagination", the trailblazing Patterson/Sutton cello and guitar duo continue to be in demand as they bring the rich cello and guitar repertoire to audiences around the world. The Patterson/Sutton duo were featured artists at the 2016 Guitar Foundation of America Convention and have an ongoing relationship with The Juilliard School as Juilliard Global Visiting Artists. The duo have been featured on Performance Today/American Public Media, Radio New Zealand, Fine Music Radio South Africa, among many others.

Tower Duo is a flute and saxophone ensemble based in Columbus, Ohio that specializes in creating engaging musical experiences with a particular interest in performing and premiering contemporary works by living composers. Tower Duo, whose members are flutist, Erin Helgeson Torres and saxophonist, Michael Rene Torres, has been performing together since 2007 and gave its inaugural recital at the Brevard Music Center Festival and Institute in North Carolina. The duo has since performed all across the United States at universities, conferences, and festivals. Highlights include the Omaha Chamber Music Society’s Eko Nova series, the Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project’s Re:Sound New Music Festival, and multiple North American Saxophone Alliance Biennial conferences. Tower Duo recently recorded their debut album, Crosswind, which features the duo’s favorite collaborations with composers from the first decade of their artistic work. Crosswind was released under the PARMA Recordings label in January of 2019.

Aidan Andrew Dun spent a fantastical childhood in the West Indies and knew his calling for poetry from an early age. Returning to London as a teenager to live with his inspirational grandmother, dancer Marie Rambert, founder of the Ballet Rambert, he briefly attended Highgate School but left without academic qualifications after taking (perhaps too seriously) the role of the rebel-chieftan Aufidius in Coriolanus. After three years travelling the world with a guitar AAD was drawn back to London to explore the psychogeography of Kings Cross, magnet to other visionaries before him. Vale Royal, gestated over twenty-three years, dreams of transforming an urban wasteland into a transcultural zone of canals at the heart of London. When Goldmark published the epic poem in 1995, Allen Ginsberg flew in from New York to perform - with Paul McCartney - at the launch of Vale Royal at the Royal Albert Hall (in a reprise of the Wholly Communion event of thirty years earlier).

Formed in 2014, DRAX is a faculty ensemble-in-residence at the University of Missouri School of Music with Leo Saguiguit (saxophone) and Megan Arns (percussion). Dedicated to performing and creating new repertoire for this unique combination of instruments, the duo made its international debut at the World Saxophone Congress in Strasbourg, France. DRAX has performed at the Mizzou International Composers Festival, the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, conferences of the North American Saxophone Alliance, Odyssey Chamber Music Series of Columbia, Mareck Center for Dance, and residencies at universities including Virginia Tech University, Sam Houston State University, Colorado State University, and the Eastman School of Music.

Jessica Dodge-Overstreet is a classical saxophonist and music theorist from Nevada. She has performed as a soloist across the United States as well as internationally in Canada, France, and Russia. Dodge passionately performs both works by living composers and transcriptions of works from before the saxophone was a standard solo voice. She has had a part in commissioning or premiering works by David Biedenbender, Viet Cuong, Mark Ford, Jenni Watson, and many others.