About

At the pinnacle of his legendary career, performer and pedagogue Robert van Sice has assembled a stunning collection of young artists who are reinventing the concert experience. The Percussion Collective transcends the medium of percussion through uncommon performance experiences that surprise and engage audiences at a profound emotional level. The hallmarks of van Sice’s musical approach—precise execution, sonic refinement, and dynamic onstage communication—are all on display in the most vivid manner to date. Drawing from an incomparably rich bouquet of talent, The Percussion Collective flexes in size offering exquisitely curated programs for an array of venues and settings.

“The extraordinary Percussion Collective…brought the audience a level of artistry, beauty, and insight more commonly found in great string quartets.” - Beijing Morning Post

Since the group’s inception in 2018, one of their hallmarks has been close collaborations with some of today’s most respected composers to create a new kind of repertoire for percussion. Grammy Award-winning composer, Christopher Theofanidis crafted his sublime concerto, Drum Circles as their first orchestral offering. In this piece, four members of The Percussion Collective along with the orchestra’s own percussion section surround the orchestra in a circle, creating an extraordinary spatial and theatrical effect.  The world premier with maestro Carlos Kalmar and the Oregon Symphony was a resounding success and The Percussion Collective has subsequently  performed the concerto with The Aspen Festival Orchestra and Michael Stern, the Hartford Symphony Orchestra with Carolyn Kuan, the Curtis Symphony Orchestra in Verizon Hall with Yu Won Kim, the Colorado Symphony with Brett Mitchell, and the Baltimore Symphony with JoAnn Falletta. Garth Neustadter’s concerto has taken them to The Louisville Symphony Orchestra with Teddy Abrams and The Boise Philharmonic with Eric Garcia.

“The four percussionists worked together so seamlessly that they almost seemed to share kind of psychic connection. Hearing (and seeing) them perform was a pure joy.” - Hartford Courant

In recital settings, the group’s unique ability to breath as one is on full display. Emmy Award-winning composer, Garth Neustadter’s magical portrait of the sea, Seaborne, is a collaboration with video artist Kjell van Sice commissioned by The Brookby Foundation for The Percussion Collective.  This exquisite, 30-minute masterpiece takes the listener/viewer on a journey of sonic and visual beauty unlike any piece previously written for percussion. The group has performed the piece more than thirty times throughout the United States and will release their newly recorded CD of the work next season. During the 2021-2022 season, The Percussion Collective with appear in recital at the Cornell Concert Series and at the Frost School of Music in Miami. In October of 2023, they will make their European debut at the Musikverein in Vienna with a program that includes their new arrangement of John Adams Hallelujah Junction for six percussionists, Alejandro Viñao’s Stress and Flow as well as the Neustadter Seaborne. The tour will also include performances in Amsterdam ’s legendary Concertgebouw, the Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, and Munich’s beautiful Allerheiligen-Hofkirche and include master classes at the Paris Conservatory and London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

The roster of The Percussion Collective includes some of the world’s most esteemed and dynamic young voices in the art form. They are drawn from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Camerata Pacifica, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble as well as faculty members from universities such as Miami’s Frost School of Music, Vanderbilt’s Blair School of Music, the University of Maryland, the University of Kansas, Mannes School of Music, Michigan State University, Arizona State University and the University of Massachusetts. Featuring players from Europe, Asia, and the US, this new generation of virtuosi represent the leading edge of innovation in concert conception and performance.

Last updated March 2022

ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

Robert van Sice is considered one of the world’s foremost performers of contemporary music for marimba. In an effort to establish the instrument as a serious artistic vehicle, he has premiered over 100 works throughout the world. Four of the seminal works in the marimba repertoire were written for him: Peter Klatzow’s Dances of Earth and Fire, Alejandro Viñao’s Estudios de Frontera, Martin Bresnick’s double marimba concerto, Grace; and James Wood’s Spirit Festival with Lamentations. Spirit Festival is unique in introducing the newly developed quarter-tone marimba, an innovative instrument recalling the marimba’s ancient sonic routes while establishing new parameters for modern expressionism.

In his varied performing career, van Sice has appeared as a soloist with symphony orchestras and given recitals in more than 30 countries throughout Europe, North America, Africa, and the Far East. He is frequently invited to appear as a soloist with Europe’s leading contemporary music ensembles, including the London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Contrechamps in Geneva and L’Itineraire in Paris. Van Sice has also appeared as a soloist with many of percussion’s finest ensembles including Amadinda, Kroumata, Tambuco, and Percussive Rotterdam.

In 1989, van Sice gave the first solo marimba recital at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. He has since appeared in many of world’s major concert halls in London, Paris, Vienna, Madrid, Milan, Stockholm, Oslo, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Toronto, Mexico City, New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. His concerts have frequently been broadcast by the BBC, Swedish Radio, Norwegian Radio, Radio France, WDR, and NPR, among many others. He is a frequent guest at major music festivals throughout the world, such as Ars Musica, Blossom, Darmstadt Course for New Music, Archipel, London Meltdown, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Bela Bartok Festival in Hungary, North American New Music Festival and the Ultima Festival in Oslo. Long a champion of the music of Olivier Messiaen, van Sice has performed on numerous occasions as a soloist alongside the composer’s wife, pianist Yvonne Loriod.

Van Sice is also one of the world’s most respected percussion teachers. His former students play in symphony orchestras, contemporary chamber ensembles, and maintain solo careers in more than twenty countries. His students have won prizes the world over in both chamber music and solo competitions. In 1997, he was appointed director of percussion studies at the Yale University School of Music. He subsequently joined the faculties of the Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University and the Curtis Institute of Music. From 1988 to 1997, he headed Europe’s first diploma program for solo marimbists at the Rotterdam Conservatory in the Netherlands. Van Sice has given over 400 master classes in 25 countries, including the Royal College of Music in London, Amsterdam Conservatory, Vienna State Music Academy, The Juilliard School, Eastman School of Music, and Oberlin College. He often serves on juries of international competitions including as the president of the jury for the 2019 ARD International Percussion Competition in Munich. He has released six CDs on the Etcetera, Mode and New World labels. For the last 25 years, van Sice has collaborated with the Adams Corporation in the Netherlands in the design of a series of marimbas and mallets bearing his name.