The International Summer Academy Salzburg Marimba and Percussion Masterclass will be held July 18-July 31, 2010 in Salzburg.

This year Peter Sadlo and Bogdan Bacanu will be the guest faculty.

For more information about this event please visit the Facebook event page.

The Classical Concert Music Group has a good selection of marimba CDs at their website. The site has some German text to navigate but it is one other place to look for European marimba CDs if you cannot find them in other places. You can also download individual tracks similar to what you can do on iTunes.

Ron Samuels of Marimba One will be attending the Marimba 2010 International Festival and Conference in Minneapolis Minnesota April 28th to May 1st and will be bringing one of the new 5-octave marimbas with Basso Bravo resonators and Enhanced Traditional Voicing.

This height-adjustable instrument will a set of cases will be for sale at an over $2500 discount. There is only 1 available so contact Marimba One now if you are interested in this fantastic deal.

The 4th annual Ney Rosauro and Jeff Moore Mallet and Percussion Camp will be held at the University of Central Florida this July 18-24, 2010. For more information about the events at this year’s camp and the application process view the online brochure.

This September 3-12, 2010 the “International Competition for Marimba, Vibraphone, Timpani, Snare Drum, Drumset and Composition for Percussion Instruments and Drumset” will take place in Fermo-Marche (Italy). It will be held during the 8th edition of the International Festival “Days of Percussion” with Master Classes, Clinics, Concerts and expositions. The competition and Festival is being organized by the Italy Percussive Arts Society.

The deadline to apply to the competition is June 1, 2010. Musicians from every country can take part in the competition. The soloists will be divided into 3 age categories (16, 23 and 30 years old) as well as 5 instrument sections Marimba, Vibraphone, Timpani, Snare Drum and Drumset.

The competition for the composers will be divided into 5 sections and there is no age limit.
1 – One percussionist
2 – DUO – percussion and piano
3 – One percussionist and Orchestra
4 – Only percussions  from DUO to SEXTET
5 – Percussions and other instruments from DUO  to SEXTET

For more information about this competition, please visit the web site at : http://www.santangelopercussioni.it.

I recently took part in a photo shoot to help the Adobe Photoshop Lightroom team test their product. The results are posted on this Facebook direct link.

Feel free to vote on which headshot you like by posting a comment on this blog or adding it as a Facebook comment.

Marimbist Ji Hye Jung has created a new web site at: http://www.jihyepercussion.com/ The site has a number of videos as well as information about projects she is working on.

Of special interest to me is the announcement of the name of the new marimba solo by John Serry. The piece is called “Groundlines”. I was honored to be a part of the consortium of 20 marimbists to make that new solo possible. Look for more information about that piece as soon as it is released later this year.

Michael Burritt came to Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota on October 10th. Concordia’s web-site had announced this clinic as being on October 3rd, but had to be rescheduled to the 10th. This change in schedule worked out great for me since I was now able to make the 3 hour drive “up north” to attend. For avid readers of this blog, Michael Burritt was also scheduled to attend last years’ Day of Percussion which had to be canceled due to flooding. You can read more about that with my earlier blog post.

I am familiar with Michael Burritt as an avid contributor to the Percussive Arts Society conventions (PASIC) as well as an author for the Percussive Notes magazine. I also had the opportunity to see him at PASIC 2001 perform the very advanced marimba solo “Escape Velocity 1.4”.

For part of the clinic he asked for a volunteer and I raised my hand. I think it was the very bright baseball jersey (American League All-Star Jersey of Minnesota Twins first baseman Justin Morneau from 2007) that caught his eye. He asked me to play some block C chords in my normal posture. Luckily I was having a good posture day and he said it looked comfortable. He then asked me to lean down over the instrument at the hips and play the chords again. I will admit that while standing over the marimba it wasn’t as easy to hear the difference, but the audience definitely could tell that my sound was more open and full when not leaning over the bars. Posture is important not only for long term health but also for the sound that you produce. Try this at home with a partner who is standing back away from the marimba and see if you can tell the difference.

Another highlight of the over two hour clinic, was a preview of a new composition of his called “Rounders” which is an advanced percussion ensemble piece available at MostlyMarimba.com. This piece is also required for the final round of the International Marimba Competition 2009 in Paris. Michael Burritt and Nancy Zeltsman are the two American jury members for this competition.

I went up to talk to Mr. Burritt after the clinic and asked if he could sign his composition “The Offering” for me, which he did.

Michael Burritt's "The Offering"

I also had this opportunity to pass on greetings from Tom Burritt. That interaction went something like this:

Jeff – “By the way, Tom says be sure to say ‘Hi Dad’ when I see you”.

Michael Burritt – “‘Hi Dad’? (laughs)”.

(Editor note – Michael Burritt and Thomas Burritt are actually cousins).

Thanks to Michael Burritt for making the trip to Minnesota, thanks to Dr. Eyler for making the clinic possible, and thanks to Zildjian for sponsoring the event and providing great door prizes!