Edgar Meyer, Composer

In demand as both a performer and a composer, Edgar Meyer has formed a role in the music world unlike any other. Hailed by The New Yorker as “...the most remarkable virtuoso in the relatively un-chronicled history of his instrument”, Mr. Meyer’s unparalleled technique and musicianship in combination with his gift for composition have brought him to the fore, where he is appreciated by a vast, varied audience. His uniqueness in the field was recognized by a MacArthur Award in 2002. 

As a solo classical bassist, Mr. Meyer can be heard on a concerto album with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra conducted by Hugh Wolff featuring Bottesini’s Gran Duo with Joshua Bell, Meyer’s own Double Concerto for Bass and Cello with Yo-Yo Ma, Bottesini’s Bass Concerto No. 2, and Meyer’s own Concerto in D for Bass. He has also recorded an album featuring three of Bach’s Unaccompanied Suites for Cello. In 2006, he released a self-titled solo recording on which he wrote and recorded all of the music, incorporating piano, guitar, mandolin, dobro, banjo, gamba, and double bass. In 2007, recognizing his wide-ranging recording achievements, Sony/BMG released a compilation of The Best of Edgar Meyer. In 2011 Mr. Meyer joined cellist Yo-Yo Ma, mandolinist Chris Thile, and fiddler Stuart Duncan for the Sony Masterworks recording “The Goat Rodeo Sessions” which was awarded the 2012 Grammy® Award for Best Folk Album. 

As a composer, Mr. Meyer has carved out a remarkable and unique niche in the musical world. One of his most recent compositions is the Double Concerto for Double Bass and Violin which received its world premiere July 2012 with Joshua Bell at the Tanglewood Music Festival with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Meyer and Mr. Bell have also performed the work at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Aspen Music Festival, and with the Nashville and Toronto symphony orchestras. In the 2011-12 season, Mr. Meyer was composer in residence with the Alabama Symphony where he premiered his third concerto for double bass and orchestra. Mr. Meyer has collaborated with Béla Fleck and Zakir Hussain to write a triple concerto for double bass, banjo, and tabla, which was commissioned for the opening of the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in Nashville. The triple concerto was recorded with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Leonard Slatkin and featured on the 2009 recording The Melody of Rhythm, a collection of trio pieces all co-composed by Mr. Meyer, Mr. Fleck and Mr. Hussain. Mr. Meyer has performed his second double bass concerto with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and his first double bass concerto with Edo de Waart and the Minnesota Orchestra. Other compositions of Mr. Meyer’s include a violin/piano work which has been performed by Joshua Bell at New York’s Lincoln Center, a quintet for bass and string quartet premiered with the Emerson String Quartet and recorded on Deutsche Grammophon, a Double Concerto for Bass and Cello premiered with Yo-Yo Ma and The Boston Symphony Orchestra under Seiji Ozawa, and a violin concerto written for Hilary Hahn which was premiered and recorded by Ms. Hahn with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra led by Hugh Wolff. 

Collaborations are a central part of Mr. Meyer’s work. His longtime collaboration with fellow MacArthur Award recipient Chris Thile continues in 2014 with the release on Nonesuch Records a recording of all new original material by the two genre bending artists, a follow up to their very successful 2008 cd/dvd on Nonesuch. Mr. Meyer and Mr. Thile will embark on a nationwide tour in Fall 2014 appearing in many of the major cities in the US. Mr. Meyer’s previous performing and recording collaborations include a duo with Béla Fleck; a quartet with Joshua Bell, Sam Bush and Mike Marshall; a trio with Béla Fleck and Mike Marshall; and a trio with Yo-Yo Ma and Mark O’Connor. The latter collaborated for the 1996 Appalachia Waltz release which soared to the top of the charts and remained there for 16 weeks. Appalachia Waltz toured extensively in the U.S., and the trio was featured both on the David Letterman Show and the televised 1997 Inaugural Gala. Joining together again in 2000, the trio toured Europe, Asia and the US extensively and recorded a follow up recording to Appalachia Waltz, Appalachian Journey, which was honored with a Grammy® Award. In the 2006-2007 season, Mr. Meyer premiered a piece for double bass and piano performed with Emanuel Ax. Mr. Meyer also performs with pianist Amy Dorfman, his longtime collaborator for solo recitals featuring both classical repertoire and his own compositions, Mike Marshall in duo concerts and the trio with Béla Fleck and Zakir Hussain which has toured the US, Europe and Asia together. 

Mr. Meyer began studying bass at the age of five under the instruction of his father and continued further to study with Stuart Sankey. In 1994 he received the Avery Fisher Career Grant and in 2000 became the only bassist to receive the Avery Fisher Prize. Currently, he is Visiting Professor of Double Bass at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.


Photo credit: Jim McGuire

Photo: Jim McGuire

George Meyer, Violin

Violinist and composer George Meyer has performed his own compositions at Chamber Music Northwest (Portland, Oregon), the Telluride and RockyGrass Bluegrass Festivals, and the Savannah Music Festival. In 2016 Ensemble Quodlibet premiered his Concerto Grosso for string quartet and orchestra in New york City. His other performances include those at the Rome Chamber and Aspen Music Festivals. He has appeared with his father Edgar Meyer and with Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas, and Mike Marshall. After graduating from Harvard in 2015 with an English degree, he began a master’s degree in violin at Juilliard in 2016. 

Mike Marshall, mandolin

Mike Marshall made his Carnegie Hall debut at the age of 20 with jazz violin legend Stephane Grappelli as a member of the David Grisman Quartet. In 1985 he would perform in that famed hall with his own classical ensemble The Modern Mandolin Quartet in 1985.

Mike has been at the forefront of New Acoustic music for over 40 years having been the founding member of many groups including the Montreux Band, Psychograss, Choro Famoso and The Anger Marshall Band. He is indeed a living compendium of musical styles and has the ability to seamlessly blend his American roots background with a deep understanding of European classical music, Brazilian choro and other world music. Mike is a fluid Jazz improviser and a master on mandolin, guitar, mandocello and violin.

Between 1999 and 2003 Mike collaborated with Joshua Bell, Edgar Meyer, Bela Fleck and Sam Bush on two separate projects. These groups toured the U.S.A. extensively and performed at the Aspen Music Festival, San Francisco Performances and Chamber Music at Lincoln Center, NY. Both ensembles were nominated for Grammy Awards for their Sony Classical releases.

In 2014 Mike was nominated for his third Grammy Award for his recording with the Turtle Island Quartet.

Currently Mike is touring with German mandolin virtuoso Caterina Lichtenberg. The two have released two cds on the Adventure Music label and have performed at the Carmel Bach Festival, The Savannah Music Festival, the Bach Haus Liepzig, Germany and the Rockygrass Bluegrass Festival in Colorado and have been soloists with the New Century Orchestra under Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, and Orchester l’arte del mondo from Cologne, Germany.

Their most recent recording is a CD of Johann Sebastian Bach duets performed on mandocello and mandolin.

Mike’s past duet projects have included tours and Cds with mandolinists Chris Thile, violinist Darol Anger, bassist Edgar Meyer, Brazilian Mandolinist Hamilton de Holanda and pianists Jovino Santos Neto and Andy Narell. His recordings can be found on the Windham Hill, Sony Classical, Rounder, Sugar Hill and Compass labels as well his own Adventure Music label.

As a music educator Mike is committed to passing on his knowledge through a variety of channels. He currently directs the Mike Marshall School of Mandolin through the ArtistWorks on-line educational company where he is teaching hundreds of mandolinists from around the world. He has published six books on mandolin technique and has produced three video instruction DVDs.

Since 2012 Mike has been the director of the Acoustic Music Seminar at the Savannah Music Festivalwhere he hand-selects fifteen of the brightest young acoustic music virtuosos from around the world (ages 15 – 22) for a week of intensive study and musical inspiration.

Between 2003 and 2015 Mike directed the Mandolin Symposium at the University of California in Santa Cruz with partner David Grisman and in 2017 he will be launching the Global Mandolin Retreats project, which will be a mandolin educational experience located in various inspiring locations around the world.

Mike splits his time currently between his home in San Francisco, CA and Wuppertal, Germany where his wife, Caterina Lichtenberg  holds the position of mandolin professor at the Cologne Music  Conservatory.

Photo credit: Claudia Kempf