2020-2021 Tidriks Distance learning INstructors

César Aguilar

Countertenor Practicum for Composers

César Aguilar is a Mexican countertenor whose vocal talents have allowed him to build his career from a very early age and, at the young age of 15, César debuted the opera "La leyenda del Tepozteco" by Mexican composer Federico Alvarez del Toro. Since that time, César has performed with orchestras in different countries, including the Mexican Marine Symphony Orchestra, Chiapas Youth Symphony Orchestra, Lethbridge Symphony, ArsMusica Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra and Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. In terms of operatic productions, he most recently performed roles in “Giulio Cesare”, "Hansel and Gretel", "L'Enfant et les Sortilèges", "La Fille du Regiment" and “Magic Flute”. He most recently brought 5 countertenors together including his teacher and mentor renowned countertenor Daniel Taylor for an evening titled “Countertenor Madness” for a sold out concert in Toronto. Recent engagements include his participation in the workshop of the new opera “The Last Dream of Frida and Diego” by acclaimed composer Gabriela Lena Frank and librettist Nilo Cruz as well as a performance at the National Art Centre in Mexico City of songs and arias. Upcoming engagements include his participation at GLFCAM in California as well as the production of Purcell’s “Fairy Queen” with the Fine Arts School of the Panamerican University in Mexico City.  In addition to his career as a performer, César is a dedicated scholar of the vocal arts. He possesses a Bachelor degree from the University of Lethbridge, a Master’s Degree from the University of Western Ontario, an Advance Certificate in Performance from the University of Toronto and is currently pursuing a Doctorate in Music from the same Institution. He was part of the Faculty at the University of Lethbridge Music Conservatoire where he had a very active vocal studio for 3 years. César has also had the extraordinary experience of working with the Latin American Flute Festival, Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute, Orford Music Academy, Canadian Operatic Arts Academy, SienaAgosto  and the Académie de Fourvière. More information can be found at www.cesaraguilarcountertenor.com.

Saul Bitran

Music Lit: Latin American String Quartet Music

Saul Bitran, first violinist of the award-winning Cuarteto Latinoamericano, is an Associate Professor of Violin at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Saul has received some of Mexico and Chile’s highest artistic awards, namely the Bellas Artes Medal and the Order of Merit Pablo Neruda.

The Cuarteto Latinoamericano is one of the world's foremost string quartets. Founded in 1982, the Cuarteto has toured extensively throughout Europe, North America, South America, Asia, and Australia, as well as premiering over one hundred new works composed for the quartet.

Accolades include winning two Latin Grammy Awards, multiple Grammy nominations as well the most prestigious French classical award, the Diapason d'Or.

A devoted teacher and chamber music coach, his former students now populate many of the finest orchestras in the world. Bitran was on the faculty of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 1987 to 2008, and he was also involved with Venezuela’s Sistema for over twenty years. There, together with the Cuarteto Latinoamericano, he created the Latin American Academy for String Quartets, which operated in Caracas from 2008 until 2013. Bitran has also taught at numerous music festivals including the Dartington International Summer School, Centre d'Arts Orford, Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music, Grenoble Festival, San Miguel de Allende Chamber Music Festival, and many others.

Saul is concertmaster of Unitas Ensemble, a Boston-based orchestra committed to introduce Latin American repertoire to US audiences. As a soloist with that orchestra, he made the premiere recording of Paul Desenne’s violin concerto (The Two Seasons of the Caribbean Tropics).

 As a recitalist with his frequent piano partner, Sally Pinkas, Bitran has been recently presenting a series of recitals exploring the connections between French and Latin American music.

Bitran’s noted solo appearances have included the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Seattle Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, and National Arts Center Orchestra in Ottawa, as well as with prominent conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen, Gerard Schwarz, Eduardo Mata, and Keith Lockhart, among others. 

Bitran is a cum laude graduate of the Samuel Rubin Academy of Music in Tel Aviv, Israel, where he studied with Professor Yair Kless. During his six years in Israel, Bitran was a substitute member of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as concertmaster of the Herzliya Chamber Orchestra.'

"Bitran's staggering virtuosity in the live violin part was jaw-dropping" - Florida Sun-Sentinel

Kyle Bruckmann

Oboe Practicum for Composers

Oboist Kyle Bruckmann tramples genre boundaries in widely ranging work as a composer/performer, educator, classical freelancer and New Music specialist. His creative output – extending from conservatory-trained foundations into gray areas encompassing free jazz, post-punk rock, and the noise underground – can be heard on more than 80 recordings from labels such as New World, Hat Art, Carrier, New Focus, Clean Feed, Another Timbre and Sick Room. His ensemble affiliations currently include Splinter Reeds, sfSound, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Eco Ensemble, Quinteto Latino, and the Stockton Symphony. He is Assistant Professor of Practice in Oboe and Contemporary Music at University of the Pacific, and also teaches at UC Santa Cruz, Davis and Berkeley.

Since moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2003, he has performed as a substitute with the San Francisco Symphony and most of the area’s regional orchestras while remaining active within an international community of improvisers and sound artists. From 1996 until his Western relocation, he was a fixture in Chicago’s thriving experimental music scene, where the most significant projects he led or collaboratively founded included EKG, Lozenge, and Wrack.

Bruckmann earned undergraduate degrees in music and psychology at Rice University in Houston, studying oboe with Robert Atherholt, serving as music director of campus radio station KTRU, and achieving academic distinction as a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He completed his M.M. in 1996 at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where he studied oboe performance with Harry Sargous and contemporary improvisation with Ed Sarath. www.kylebruckmann.com 

Lizzie Burns

Bass Practicum for Composers

Lizzie Burns is a bassist and educator with a passion for discovery and sharing the love of music.  As a specialist in small ensemble playing, she enjoys performing in settings from chamber orchestras and continuo sections, to rhythm sections and new music ensembles.  She loves working with composers to bring new works to life, as well as championing the modern solo repertoire that shines a spotlight on the unique qualities the bass encompasses as a solo instrument.

One of Lizzie’s favorite parts of a life in music is drawing abundant inspiration from the amazing colleagues and ensembles she works with. She feels fortunate to frequently perform with the International Contemporary Ensemble, St Paul Chamber Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, A Far Cry, The Knights, New Orchestra of Washington, New York City Ballet Orchestra, New Haven Symphony, and Decoda.  Burns plays with Jon Batise of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” with whom she has also recorded. She is grateful to have spent 5 years at the Yellow Barn festival in Vermont, which played an instrumental role developing her understanding of chamber music and finding her voice in contemporary repertoire.

Though she always loved music as a child, it took Lizzie many tries to find the right instrument.  It was the guitar that her got passionate about pursuing music, which led her to the electric bass as she played in bands throughout her youth.  The bass is the connective tissue in an ensemble and the role that made her fall in love with the instrument.  In high school, playing in the rhythm section for musicals was extremely formative in teaching her that role and responsibility.  She continues to work in theater today and has played on Broadway and the American Repertory Theater in productions such as “Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812” and “Moby Dick”.

Lizzie is an alum of Ensemble Connect: A Program of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School and The Weill Music Institute in Partnership with The New York City Department of Education.  Along with the performance opportunities and professional development afforded in the fellowship, she was given formative Teaching Artist training while partnered with the Celia Cruz Bronx High School for Music.  In her weekly school visits the students taught her how critical music is for young people, and she took great joy in developing creative and engaging ways for them to express themselves and cultivate musical skills.  She has taught masterclasses, coachings, group lessons, and individual instruction for the Bronx Arts Ensemble and the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras, as well as community music schools in Brooklyn.  She has worked with students one on one since college when her teacher entrusted her to tutor the younger students in the studio.  She loves teaching private lessons and gives each lesson all the attention and energy she has, just as her teachers did for her.

Lizzie holds Bachelor’s degrees in both and Performance and Music Theory from the New England Conservatory of Music, and pursed graduate studies at Boston University.  Her primary teachers include Don Palma and Ed Barker, to whom she is eternally grateful. https://www.lizzieburnsbass.com

Megan Conley

Harp Practicum for Composers

Megan Conley (née Levin) had a musical upbringing in Austin, Texas. She began harp lessons at the age of five and grew up playing music in the family band. By the time she was 15, she had played on several albums of Austin musicians, including the Grammy Award-winning album ‘Los Super Seven.’

Megan studied at Rice University and as a Fulbright scholar in Paris, France. In 2012, Megan won first place in the international Ima Hogg Competition and subsequently performed the Ginastera Harp Concerto with the Houston Symphony.

As a freelance harpist, Megan has performed with the New York City Ballet, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the Sarasota Opera Orchestra, the Irish Chamber Orchestra, and the Bang On a Can All-Stars, as well as playing ‘The Fantasticks’ on Broadway.

Megan joined the Houston Symphony as Principal Harpist in January 2015, and is a member of the Brooklyn-based chamber orchestra The Knights.

Away from the harp, Megan is an amateur permaculturalist and homesteader, as well as a climate justice activist. She lives in Houston and Brooklyn with her husband Shawn and their young son Osian.

Shawn Conley

Bass Practicum for Composers

Hawaiian born bassist and composer Shawn Conley grew up loving all types of music. This love of diversity of sound developed into a career that straddles many genres. He has been playing with the Silkroad Ensemble for six years and is a member of the Brooklyn-based chamber orchestra The Knights. Recent projects include Silkroad’s Grammy Award-winning album Sing Me Home, an upcoming release of the Brahms and Beethoven violin concertos with Gil Shaham and The Knights, the world premiere tour of Osvaldo Golijov’s Falling Out of Time (commissioned by Silkroad), as well as an international tour of the new performance-art piece The Head and the Load created by South African visual artist William Kentridge. Shawn can also be heard on The Knights album Azul, featuring Silkroad founder Yo-Yo Ma.

As a studio musician, he has performed on multiple soundtracks including True Grit, Moonrise Kingdom, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, The Vietnam War documentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, and the Amazon series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. 

Shawn studied at Rice University with Paul Ellison and in Paris, France with Francois Rabbath. Shawn currently splits his time between Brooklyn, NY and Houston, TX with his wife Megan, and their son Osian.  

Rob Davies

Special Topics: Climate Intelligence and Action for Artists

Robert Davies is a physicist whose work focuses on complexity, global change, human vibrancy, and critical science communication. Rob has delivered hundreds of public lectures ― to policymakers, business leaders, civic organizations and faith communities ― and his “performance science” theatrical collaboration The Crossroads Project | Rising Tide has been performed across the U.S. and in three countries. Dr. Davies has served as a scientific liaison for NASA on the International Space Station Project; as a project scientist with Utah State University’s Space Dynamics Laboratory; and an officer and meteorologist in the United States Air Force. He is currently Associate Professor of Professional Practice with Utah State University’s Department of Physics.

Chris Froh

Percussion Practicum for Composers

Percussionist Christopher Froh specializes in promoting and influencing the creation of new music through critically-acclaimed performances and dynamic lectures. A member of the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Empyrean Ensemble, Rootstock Percussion, and San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, Froh has premiered over 100 chamber and solo works by composers from 15 countries. He is known for his energized performances which have been hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as “tremendous” and San Francisco Classical Voice as “mesmerizing. As a soloist, he has appeared at festivals and recitals across Japan, China, Turkey, Europe, and the United States including the Chamber Music Society at Lincoln Center. He has recorded, to critical acclaim, with the San Francisco Symphony on SFS Media; as a soloist on Albany, Bridge, Innova, and Equilibrium labels; and as a chamber musician on Music@Menlo LIVE. He frequently tours Japan with marimbist Mayumi Hama and with his former teacher, famed marimba pioneer Keiko Abe.

Active in music for theatre and dance, Froh has recorded scores for American Conservatory Theater, performed as a soloist with the Berkeley Repertory Theater, and composed original music for Oakland-based Dance Elixir. His score for the Harvard Museum of Natural History’s exhibition of Thoreau’s Walden: A Journey in Photography has toured the United States.

Currently, Chris teaches percussion at the University of California at Davis and CSU Sacramento.

Haruka Fujii

Percussion Practicum for Composers

Multi-percussionist Haruka Fujii has become one of the most prominent solo percussionists and marimbists of her generation. She has won international acclaim for her interpretations of contemporary music, having performed premieres of works from composers including Tan Dun, Nico Muhly, Vijay Iyer, Joji Yuasa, and Maki Ishii. Since 2010 Ms. Fujii has performed as a member of the Grammy Award winning Silk Road Ensemble, joining a group of international musicians founded by Yo-Yo Ma. She has frequently collaborated with composer Tan Dun, performing his Water Percussion Concerto, Paper Percussion Concerto, and opera Tea in major venues across the world

Ms. Fujii’s passion for introducing audiences to new percussion music has put her on stage with diverse orchestras and ensembles. She has appeared as a soloist with the Munich Philharmonic, Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, Metropolitan Opera, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Nationale de Lyon, and the NHK Symphony Orchestra. She is a member of Flexible Music  and the Line C3 Percussion Group and two New York based ensembles and also Utari Percussion Duo, a duet project with her sister Rika which actively commission new compositions from young composers. Her world premiere recordings can be found on the SONY, Kosei, ALM Records, and Deutsche Grammophon labels. In addition to her career as a performing artist Ms. Fujii directed the percussion department at the University of Connecticut from 2009-2011, and has been a frequent guest instructor at Juilliard Summer Percussion Seminar and several international percussion festivals.

Born in Saitama, Japan, Ms. Fujii began her musical studies on the piano at the age of three. Influenced by her mother, noted marimbist Mutsuko Fujii, she developed interest in percussion instruments. She studied music at the Tokyo National University, the Juilliard School, and the Mannes College of Music.

Ray Furuta

Flute Practicum for Composers

Dubbed “The Rockstar of the Flute” by the Informador de Guadalajara (Mexico), Mexican-Japanese American flutist Ray Furuta has performed worldwide as a commanding and versatile performing artist within the classical, contemporary, world, jazz, and pop sectors.

Officiated as a cultural ambassador to the United States of America in 2014, Furuta has toured as a performer and teacher across Mexico, Japan, Austria, Czech-Republic, Poland, Hungary, and throughout the Middle East and North America. He has performed for internationally recognized names including Yo-Yo Ma’s Silkroad Ensemble, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, The Juilliard School, The United Nations, and the Mainly Mozart, Okayama, Sarasota, and Yellowbarn Music Festivals. As a dynamic performer, he has also frequented the stage as a concerto soloist, championing the contemporary concerti of Yuko Uebayashi, Brett Dean, and Paul Schoenfield and a touring solo recitalist mastering the cornerstones of the flute repertoire.

Dedicated to Chamber Music, Furuta maintained an active role as the flutist with several ensembles including Furuta/Cann Duo with pianist Michelle Cann, Furuta/Kibbey duo with harpsit Bridget Kibbey, Furujii with percussionist Haruka Fujii, and the Burkart Duo with flutist Carol Wincenc. He has also shared the stage with classical luminaries including Jon Nakamatsu, Peter Frankl, and members of the Avalon, Brooklyn Rider, Kronos, Mendelssohn, and Emerson String Quartets. Additionally, his passion for world music has led to performances with superstars Van Anh Vo (Danh Tranh), Sandeep Das (Indian Tabla), Vijay Gopal (Bansuri), Merima Kljuco (Accordion), Ghassan Sahhab (Qanun), and Christina Pato (Galacian Bagpipe) to name only a few. He is also a member of the Mexico-city based Contemporary Mexican Jazz Band, Toktli, and is a leading-artist-member of the Common Sounds ensemble.

As a passionate teaching artist, Furuta is a Lecturer of Performance Practice and Music & Social Justice at Santa Clara University. In addition, he leads courses in global music performance and ethnomusicology. Prior to this, he served as an instructor in flute and chamber music for the undergraduate music department at Stony Brook University as the hand-selected teaching assistant to the Emerson String Quartet.

He has held residencies and given master classes at institutions including the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Stanford University, Lebanese American University of Beirut, UC San Diego, San Jose State University, University of Victoria (BC), and New York University, among others. In addition, he is a regularly rotating faculty member of the Icicle Creek Chamber Music Institute, Imagine Music Seminar in Beirut, and the Orqesta Sinfonica Juvenil de Guadalajara.

As an artistic philanthropist, Ray Furuta’s passion for social justice has led much of his musical career to bring music to marginalized communities around the world. Under his initiative Mas Amor Arts, his ongoing projects include a presence in local juvenile detention centers and collaborative projects with homeless women of color to address injustices of gender, race, finances, healthcare, and homelessness. In addition, he has established an annual project in the disenfranchised districts of Tijuana, Mexico to bring music education to youth in an effort to keep them out of the streets. He has also performed for Syrian Refugees in the Middle East. Subsequently, he has developed Music & Social Justice curriculum for the Music Department at Santa Clara University.

As a celebrated curator, he is the Producing Artistic Director for Chamber Music Silicon Valley, a leading Californian arts organization. As well as Santa Clara University’s weekly Music@Noon concert series. He was named the winner of the 2018 X-Factor Arts Prize, which recognizes entrepreneurial and innovative ideas to advance the arts and creativity. And most recently, was announced as the 2019 “On the Stage” Artist Laureate of SVCreates, design to identify and recognize Silicon Valley’s finest artists based on the quality of their work and their commitment to enriching the community. In addition, he is an alumnus of the Multicultural Artist Leadership Institute (MALI).

As a recipient of the prestigious Staller Scholar and distinguished alumni “40 under 40” awards, Ray Furuta holds his doctor of musical arts degree from Stony Brook University where he was a pupil of Carol Wincenc and the Emerson String Quartet. Other important influences include flutists Isabelle Chapuis, Jill Felber, and Elena Yarritu, harpsichordist Arthur Haas, and pianist and artistic visionary Wu Han. https://rayfuruta.com/

Nathalie Joachim

Flute Practicum for Composers

Nathalie Joachim is a Grammy-nominated flutist, composer, and vocalist. The Brooklyn born Haitian-American artist is hailed for being “a fresh and invigorating cross-cultural voice”. (The Nation). She is co-founder of the critically acclaimed urban art pop duo, Flutronix, and comfortably navigates everything from classical to indie-rock, all while advocating for social change and cultural awareness. Her authenticity has gained her the reputation of being "powerful and unpretentious." (The New York Times).

Ms. Joachim, a 2020 United States Artists Fellow, has performed and recorded with an impressive range of today’s most exciting artists and ensembles including Bryce Dessner, Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Richard Reed Parry, Miguel Zenón, and the International Contemporary Ensemble, and is the former flutist of contemporary chamber ensemble Eighth Blackbird. As a composer, Joachim is regularly commissioned to write for instrumental and vocal artists, dance, and interdisciplinary theater, each highlighting her unique electroacoustic style. Current commissions include Discourse, an evening-length performance, community engagement and social change initiative commissioned by Carolina Performing Arts; new solo instrumental works for cellist Seth Parker Woods and violinist Yvonne Lam; and larger scale chamber works for So Percussion, Lorelei Ensemble, Duo Noire, and The Brooklyn Youth Chorus.

Joachim’s current touring project, Fanm d’Ayiti, is an evening-length work for flute, voice, string quartet and electronics that celebrates some of Haiti’s most iconic yet under recognized female artists, and explores Joachim’s personal Haitian heritage. Commissioned by and developed in residence through St. Paul Chamber Orchestra’s Liquid Music series, Fanm d’Ayiti was recorded with Chicago-based ensemble Spektral Quartet. The work, released in 2019 on New Amsterdam Records as Joachim’s first featured solo album, received a Grammy nomination for Best World Music Album.

Ms. Joachim is Director of Contemporary Chamber Music at the Perlman Music Program; holds rotating faculty positions at the Bang On a Can Summer Festival and Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity; and is a guest teaching artist for The Juilliard-Nord Anglia Performing Arts Programme.

Charles Overton

Harp Practicum for Composers

Charles Overton is a Boston-based harpist and performer of classical, jazz and world music. He began his harp studies at the age of ten under the direction of Lynelle Ediger, where as a member of her "American Youth Harp Ensemble" he was afforded the opportunity at an early age to perform internationally in notable venues such as the Salle Gaveaux in Paris and Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall. In 2009 Charles went on to attend the Interlochen Arts Academy to further his musical development under the direction of Joan Raeburn Holland during which time he was a prizewinner in the Young Artist Harp Competition and was twice a finalist for the Interlochen Arts Academy Concerto Competition.

In 2012 Charles moved to Boston to attend the Berklee College of Music, where while continuing to study classical music under the direction of BSO principal harpist, Jessica Zhou, he also began to explore the world of jazz and other improvised musics more seriously. During his time at Berklee, he competed in the 2013 American Harp Society National Competition where he was a finalist, and became the first harp student to be admitted to the Berklee Global Jazz Institute - a prestigious and highly specialized program at the school in which students are able to learn from and work intimately with master jazz artists such as Danilo Perez, John Patitucci, Joe Lovano, and Terri-Lynn Carrington.

Over the course of his musical career, Charles has attended several summer music festivals such as the Tanglewood Music Center, Pacific Music Festival, and the Castleton Festival where he has performed under the batons of conductors such as Stéphane Denève, Jun Markl, Stefan Asbury, and the late Lorin Maazel. Additionally he has performed with various ensembles in some of the world's greatest concert halls including Tokyo’s Suntory Hall, the Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall, the Berlin Philharmonic, Boston's Symphony Hall and the KKL Luzern Concert Hall.

Currently, Charles resides in Boston where he maintains an active performance schedule as a performer of classical, jazz and contemporary music. Recent engagements include an appearance at Scullers Jazz Club with his jazz ensemble: the Charles Overton Group, regular performances with the Boston Philharmonic, an appearance as a featured artist at the Dutch Harp Festival in concert with the Dutch National Youth Jazz Orchestra, as well as a performance tour of Spain performing Ginastera's Harp Concerto with Benjamin Zander's Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. http://www.charlesovertonmusic.com/

Midori Samson

Bassoon Practicum for Composers

Midori Samson (she/her) is a bassoonist, educator, activist, and scholar. Thanks to a wide range of professional experiences across the USA and abroad, she has pursued a well-rounded career that unites these four identities. She is happiest participating in artistic projects that simultaneously engage all of her creative interests: bassoon performance, music education, activism/just action, and research and scholarship. She couldn’t—and wouldn’t want to—seek success in any one of these areas without the other three. https://www.midorisamson.com/

Aeryn Santillan

Music Lit: A Brief History of DIY Punk 1980-2020

Aeryn Jade Santillan (she/her) is a composer, guitarist, and bassist whose work is heavily influenced by the DIY punk scene and actively aims to blur the lines between band/ensemble and song/composition.

Aeryn performs bass in the New Jersey based, internationally touring screamo quartet, Massa Nera. Along with composer/guitarist Andrew Noseworthy, she co-founded this place is actually the worst, an experimental mathcore duo, and post-genre DIY label, people | places | records.

Aeryn holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Columbia College Chicago and a Master of Music in Theory and Composition degree from New York University. Previous mentors include Gabriela Lena Frank, Michael Gordon, Julia Wolfe, Marcos Balter, David Reminick, Drew Baker, and Ilya Levinson. Aeryn has been a fellow at the Bang on a Can Summer Festival, Toronto Creative Music Lab, and the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music.

Aeryn enjoys biking, skateboarding, RPGs, and vegan tacos. She lives in Jersey City, NJ with her partner and two cats. http://aerynsantillan.com/

Rajna Swaminathan

Music Lit: Intro to Karnatik Indian Music

Rajna Swaminathan is an acclaimed mrudangam (South Indian percussion) artist, composer, and scholar. In her music and research, she explores the undercurrents of rhythmic experience and emergent textures in collective improvisation. Described as “a vital new voice” (Pop Matters), Rajna’s creative trajectory blossomed through a search for resonance and fluidity among musical forms and aesthetic worlds.

One of only a few women who play the mrudangam professionally, Rajna received her creative foundation on the instrument from her father, P.K. Swaminathan, and mrudangam legend Umayalpuram K. Sivaraman. While Rajna spent much of her youth performing in the karnatik music and bharatanatyam scenes across the diaspora and in India, her music has also been informed by her study of Western classical piano, an affinity for Indian film music and other popular musics, and extensive collaborations with improvisers in New York’s creative music scene.

Rajna’s compositions draw on a deep knowledge of South Indian rhythm, polyrhythmic sensibilities from jazz and African diasporic music, and the melodic essence and harmonic potential of Indian ragas. In 2013, she founded the ensemble RAJAS, writing expansive, boundary breaking music for herself and like-minded improvisers, spanning multiple musical approaches. Rajas is a Sanskrit word describing the human energy that compels us toward action, creation, and change, and the ensemble members embody this spirit in their creative, open-ended approach to improvisation. Rajna’s debut album with RAJAS, Of Agency and Abstraction (Biophilia Records, 2019), has been lauded as “music of gravity and rigor… yet its overall effect is accessible and uplifting” (Wall Street Journal).

In addition to her projects, Rajna performs extensively in ensembles led by Vijay Iyer, Amir ElSaffar, María Grand, Ganavya Doraiswamy, and Aakash Mittal. As a composer-performer for dance and theater works, Rajna has toured widely with Ragamala Dance (Minneapolis), and collaborated with playwright/actress Anu Yadav. Rajna is also an experienced educator, and has taught as faculty at the Banff International Jazz and Creative Music Workshop, Jazz Camp of Philadelphia, and KoSA International Percussion Workshop, among others.

Rajna is a founding member of the We Have Voice Collective, which seeks to shift the cultural landscape of the performing arts, bringing awareness to issues of inequity and creating safe(r) spaces. Rajna holds degrees in Anthropology and French from the University of Maryland, College Park, and is currently pursuing a PhD in Music (Creative Practice and Critical Inquiry) at Harvard University.

Some recent commissions include Chamber Music America New Jazz Works (2019-2021), Los Angeles Philharmonic Green Umbrella Series (2020), Bang On A Can Marathon (2020), and National Sawdust Digital Discovery Festival / JACK Quartet (2020). http://www.rajnaswaminathan.com/

Titus Underwood

Oboe Practicum for Composers

Titus Underwood is the Principal Oboe of the Nashville Symphony, having previously served as Acting Principal Oboe since September 2017. Prior to performing with the Nashville Symphony, he served as Acting Associate Principal of the Utah Symphony. He received his Master of Music from The Juilliard School, where he studied with Elaine Douvas, with additional studies with Nathan Hughes and Pedro Díaz. He earned his Bachelor of Music at the Cleveland Institute of Music as a pupil of John Mack, legendary principal oboist of The Cleveland Orchestra. While there, he also studied with Frank Rosenwein and Jeffrey Rathbun. 

Underwood has performed as Guest Associate Principal of Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and as Guest Principal of Miami Symphony Orchestra and Florida Orchestra. He has also played with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Atlanta Symphony, Puerto Rico Symphony and San Diego Symphony. He was an Oboe Fellow at Aspen Music Festival and has performed at the Grand Tetons Festival. He will serve as Principal Oboe at the Bellingham Music Festival in summer 2019. Other festivals he has attended include Music Academy of the West, National Repertory Orchestra and Domaine Forget.