Performers for 2008 Season

James Campbell

In 1997 James Campbell received Canada's highest honor, the Order of Canada. This was given in recognition of 25 years performing clarinet concerts in Canada and throughout the world. Campbell is considered by many as Canada's pre-eminent clarinetist and wind soloist and has performed in most of the world's major concert halls. His discography includes over 20 albums, many of which have won international acclaim. James Campbell is the Artistic Director of the annual Canadian summer music festival, The Festival of the Sound. Mr. Campbell is Professor of Music at Indiana University School of Music.

Gene DiNovi

Gene DiNovi began his musical life as a jazz pianist in New York in 1945. Dizzie Gillespie was one of the first to recognize his potential. Later he played and recorded with Bennie Goodman, Artie shaw, Buddy Rich, Chubby Jackson and boyd Raebum. In the 1960's he came to Hollywood where he was involved in television production working on the Sheldon Leonard-Danny Thomas shows among others. In the winter of 1997, the Smithsonian Institute conducted a life-history interview with Gene for two days to capture the highlights of his remarkable career.

Dave Young

Dave Young began his musical career on guitar and violin at age ten, but soon swithched to bass. As a classical artist he has played principal double bass with Canadian orchestras in Edmonton and Winnipeg. As a jazz artist he has appeared with countless jazz greats such as Oscar Peterson. He is also a dedicated jazz educator and is a faculty member of both Humber College and The University of Toronto. He regularly tours with James Campbell and Gene DiNovi in a program of "Classical Fusion" that melds the classical and jazz worlds.

SECOND BI-COASTAL RAGTIME REVUE

starring:

Gene Nichols, Associate Professor of Music, University of Maine/Machias; "Fakwad" in the Hokum W. Jeeb's Original Gypsy Medicine Show; multi-instrumentalist Machiasport, Maine

Hokum W. Jeebs, Seattle, Washington
Hokum W. Jeebs is a one man musical theater. Out of his trunk emerge such eccentric instruments as toy piano, saw, tuba muffler and snorkel. He sings and plays from an amazingly ecclectic repertoire that ranges from classical warhorses to obscure popular songs and good old American ragtime. His stylish and witty perspective on music, his wild comic imagination, deadpan delivery and broad knowledge of the vaudeville period has delighted audiences across the continent and around the world.

Glenn Jenks, Well-known ragtime composer and pianist; Camden, Maine
This dynamic pianist, composer, teacher and performer doesn't recall a day in his life without music. He taught in private schools before embarking on a career as a solo performer of folk music and ragtime. He toured with country music singer and humorist Jud Strunk for three years as guitarist and vocalist. During the 1980's he was frequently assiociated with the New Vaudville revival, serving as official pianist of the New England New Vaudeville Review. He has composed dozens of works in a sophisticated ragtime idiom plus numerous classical chamber works.

Masanobu Ikemiya, Internationally renowned classical/ragtime pianist; Bar Harbor, Maine
Mr. Ikemiya founded the Arcady Music Festival and was the artistic director for 24 years. Since 1995 he has toured annually in Japan with members of the New York Philharmonic and the New York Ragtime Orchestra which he founded and is the leader and pianist. He has received world wide attention for his many international concerts. He has received an award from the United Nations for promoting world peace through music.

The Brubeck Brothers Quartet
Sponsored by the Machias Savings Bank

The Brubeck Brothers Quartet is an exciting jazz group featuring two members of one of America's most accomplished musical families, Daniel Brubeck (drums) and Chris Brubeck (bass and trombone). Guitarist Mike DeMicco and pianist Chuck Lamb complete this dynamic quartet. They have performed at concert series, colleges and jazz festivals across North America and Europe. The group also collaborates with orchestras such as the Utah Symphony conducted by Keith Lockhart and many chamber groups.

INNOVATA

INNOVATA is made up of top talent from New England and around the country. The musicians come from a pool of hand selected performers that have appeared with such renowned organizations as the Boston Pops, Boston Symphony, Boston Ballet, Portland Symphony, the Artie Shaw Band and other leading organizations around the world. The wide range of experience that each person brings to the group compliments the versitile repertoire INNOVATA presents.

St. Lawrence String Quartet

Goeff Nuttall, violin; Barry Shiffman, violin; Lesley Robertson, viola; Chris Costanza, cello
According to Alex Ross, music critic of the New Yorker Magazine, "the St. Lawrence are remarkable not simply for the quality of their music making...but for the joy they take in the act of connection." The Washington Post calls their spontaneous music making "emotionally high charged but never out of control." The quartet is passionately committed to performing and expanding the works of living composers as well as playing traditional repertoire. Recent tours of Europe have included London's Wigmore Hall, Paris' Theatre de Ville and Amsterdam's Concertbouw.

Jonathan Dimmock

Organist Jonathan Dimmock is well-known internationally as a recitalist, choral conductor, vocal coach, accompanist, continuo player, San Fransisco Symphany musician and church organist. He has held posts at Westminster Abbey in London, The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York City and St. Mark's Cathedral in Minneapolis, and currently serves as organist of St. Ignatius Church, San Francisco. He has toured widely over five continents, has been featured on numerous radio and television stations and has recorded over 20 CDs.

Concert organist Jonathan Dimmock has distinguished himself through his dazzling and highly sensitive performances in churches, major concert halls, music festivals and cathedrals throughout the world. Lauded for his diverse repertoire and his engagement with audiences, his performing is marked by both musical depth and a distinctive personalness, causing audiences immediately to warm to him. Hailed by the Eskilstuna-Kuriren (Sweden) for "power and flaming brio," cited by the Natal Mercury (South Africa) for "musicianship, taste, and unostentatious virtuosity," and described by the Adelaide Advertiser (Australia) as playing in such a way that "the organ has rarely sounded more clear and multi-hued than in his very expert and virtuoso hands and feet," Jonathan is considered by many to be one of the leading musicians in his field.