Dorothy Lawson

Last updated

Dorothy Lawson is a Canadian cellist and composer based in New York City. [1] [2] She is best known as a co-founder and artistic director of the string quartet ETHEL. [3] [4] On the founding of ETHEL she says, "we... realized that we were in the middle of a really powerful new upsurge of creative energy in music of our time that we were kind of the perfect vehicle for." [5]

Prior to ETHEL, Lawson toured with Mikhail Baryshnikov's White Oak Dance Project, Bang on a Can All-Stars and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. She was a founding member of the Rossetti and Roerich String Quartets, and served 10 years as faculty of Joseph Fuchs' Alfred University Summer Chamber Music Institute. [6] [7] [8] Lawson was an orchestra member of the 2002 Off-Broadway production of Jason Robert Brown's The Last Five Years and the 2005 Broadway production of The Woman in White . [9] [10] She has been a member of the Ron Carter Nonet. [11] Lawson appears on multiple recordings, including the GRAMMY Award-winning album Dedicated to You: Kurt Elling Sings the Music of Coltrane and Hartman [12] [13] She is a member of acclaimed Brazilian jazz pianist Marcelo Zarvos +Group. [14] [15] Lawson is a graduate of the Juilliard School and a current faculty at the Preparatory Division of Mannes College at the New School. [16] She is quoted numerous times in the book How to Grow as a Musician: What All Musicians Must Know to Succeed by Sheila E. Anderson on the topic of how to balance work and family as a working musician. [17]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ron Carter</span> American musician and composer (born 1937)

Ronald Levin Carter is an American jazz double bassist. His appearances on 2,221 recording sessions make him the most-recorded jazz bassist in history. He has won three Grammy awards, and is also a cellist who has recorded numerous times on that instrument.

Shulamit Ran is an Israeli-American composer. She moved from Israel to New York City at 14, as a scholarship student at the Mannes College of Music. Her Symphony (1990) won her the Pulitzer Prize for Music. In this regard, she was the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, the first being Ellen Taaffe Zwilich in 1983. Ran was a professor of music composition at the University of Chicago from 1973 to 2015. She has performed as a pianist in Israel, Europe and the U.S., and her compositional works have been performed worldwide by a wide array of orchestras and chamber groups.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cool jazz</span> Sub-genre of jazz associated with the U.S. West Coast

Cool jazz is a style of modern jazz music inspired by bebop and big band that arose in the United States after World War II. It is characterized by relaxed tempos and a lighter tone than that used in the fast and complex bebop style. Cool jazz often employs formal arrangements and incorporates elements of classical music. Broadly, the genre refers to a number of post-war jazz styles employing a more subdued approach than that of contemporaneous jazz idioms. As Paul Tanner, Maurice Gerow, and David Megill suggest, "the tonal sonorities of these conservative players could be compared to pastel colors, while the solos of [Dizzy] Gillespie and his followers could be compared to fiery red colors."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shelly Manne</span> American jazz drummer

Sheldon "Shelly" Manne was an American jazz drummer. Most frequently associated with West Coast jazz, he was known for his versatility and also played in a number of other styles, including Dixieland, swing, bebop, avant-garde jazz, and later fusion. He also contributed to the musical background of hundreds of Hollywood films and television programs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Don Ellis</span> Musical artist

Donald Johnson Ellis was an American jazz trumpeter, drummer, composer, and bandleader. He is best known for his extensive musical experimentation, particularly in the area of time signatures. Later in his life he worked as a film composer, contributing a score to 1971's The French Connection and 1973's The Seven-Ups.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Harrell</span> American jazz musician, composer, and arranger

Tom Harrell is an American jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, composer, and arranger. Voted Trumpeter of the Year of 2018 by Jazz Journalists Association, Harrell has won awards and grants throughout his career, including multiple Trumpeter of the Year awards from DownBeat magazine, SESAC Jazz Award, BMI Composers Award, and Prix Oscar du Jazz. He received a Grammy Award nomination for his big band album, Time's Mirror.

West Coast jazz refers to styles of jazz that developed in Los Angeles and San Francisco during the 1950s. West Coast jazz is often seen as a subgenre of cool jazz, which consisted of a calmer style than bebop or hard bop. The music relied relatively more on composition and arrangement than on the individually improvised playing of other jazz styles. Although this style dominated, it was not the only form of jazz heard on the American West Coast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steve Kuhn</span> American jazz musician

Steve Kuhn is an American jazz pianist, composer, arranger, bandleader, and educator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tim Cobb</span> Musical artist

Timothy Cobb is the American current principal double bassist with the New York Philharmonic. He previously taught at the Peabody Institute of Music, and joined the Manhattan School of Music faculty in 1992. Cobb also currently teaches at SUNY Purchase, Lynn University, Rutgers University: Mason Gross School of the Arts, YOA Orchestra of the Americas, and Mannes School of Music Preparatory Division. He is the current chair of the double-bass department at the Juilliard School, where he has been on faculty since 2002.

Ethel is a New York based string quartet that was co-founded in 1998 by Ralph Farris, viola; Dorothy Lawson, cello; Todd Reynolds, violin; and Mary Rowell, violin. Unlike most string quartets, Ethel plays with amplification and integrates improvisation into its performances. The group's current membership includes violinists Kip Jones and Corin Lee.

Homer Mensch was a prominent classical bassist who was a former member of the Pittsburgh Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the New York Pops, and the NBC Symphony. Mensch held faculty positions at Yale University, at the Manhattan School of Music, the Juilliard School, the Mannes College of Music, Rutgers University, Dalcroze School, Queens College, and Catholic University. He taught upwards of 45 students a week from beginners, to conservatory students, to professionals both in the classical and jazz fields.

Ralph Farris is an American violist, violinist, composer, arranger, producer and conductor, best known as a founding member and artistic director of the ensemble ETHEL. Farris is an electric string player with a lengthy career that spans the gamut of musical genres from rock and jazz to Broadway. His instruments are outfitted with a piezoelectric pickup which allows him to play amplified. Amplification was initially adopted early in Farris's career in order to facilitate the playing of various "contemporary classical" pieces that involve electronic components. It continues to be integral to his signature sound.

Stafford James is an American double-bassist and composer.

Jennifer Choi is a Korean-American violinist based in New York City. Choi graduated from the Juilliard School and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and has performed in a variety of settings including solo violin, chamber music, and creative improvisation and performed with the Oregon Symphony, the Portland Columbia Symphony, the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, the Portland Youth Philharmonic, and the String Orchestra of New York City (SONYC) among others.

<i>The Visibility of Thought</i> 2001 studio album by Muhal Richard Abrams

The Visibility of Thought is an album of contemporary classical compositions by Muhal Richard Abrams performed by various ensembles which was released on the Mutable Music label in 2001. The album features performances by Abrams, Jon Deak, Joseph Kubera, Mark Feldman, Thomas Buckner, the string quartet ETHEL and Phillip Bush.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joseph Brent</span> Musical artist

Joseph Frederick Brent is an American composer, mandolinist, multi-instrumentalist, and teacher. He is known for his performances and arrangements of rock and indie songs, as well as his original compositions with the ensemble 9 Horses. He teaches classical mandolin at Mannes College.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patrick Zimmerli</span> American musician and composer (born 1968)

Patrick Zimmerli is an American saxophonist, composer, arranger, and record producer.

John Garvey was an American musician, orchestra leader, and academic who played viola in the Walden String Quartet for 23 seasons, introduced a jazz curriculum at the University of Illinois, and created its Jazz Big Band which he led until his retirement from the university in 1991. The jazz band dominated collegiate jazz festival awards in its early days and in 1969 was chosen by the state department to tour the USSR and Eastern Europe. Many members of Garvey's jazz bands went on to successful careers as professional musicians and academics.

Jack Aloysius Reilly was an American jazz pianist.

<i>Super Strings</i> 1981 studio album by Ron Carter

Super Strings is an album by bassist Ron Carter which was recorded in 1981 and released on the Milestone label.

References

  1. The Canadian Encyclopedia
  2. "An Environmental Album Recaptured in a Concert ‘Documerica,’ at BAM, Featuring the New-Music Quartet Ethel",The New York Times, by Steve Smith, Oct. 6, 2013
  3. "Traveling With a Moody Old Friend That’s Tightly Strung", The New York Times, by Dorothy Lawson, April 8, 2008
  4. ETHEL: IT'S ABOUT TIME., Classical Music and Dance Guide, The New York Times, November 1, 2002
  5. Art Works Podcast: Dorothy Lawson and Ralph Farris, of the new music quartet ETHEL, National Endowment for the Arts
  6. Arts Ashima Music Festival Bio
  7. Grand Canyon Music Festival Bio
  8. Mannes Faculty
  9. AllMusic Credits
  10. Broadway World Credits
  11. "Jazz Bassist Ron Carter: Helping Others Sound Their Best, Famed musician is a stand-up guy", All Things Strings, by Dan Ouellette, May 2004 "Jazz Bassist Ron Carter: Helping Others Sound Their Best / Interviews & Profiles / News / All Things Strings". Archived from the original on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 2015-03-25.
  12. Allmusic Credits
  13. Artist Direct
  14. All About Jazz review
  15. Allmusic review
  16. Mannes Faculty
  17. How to Grow as a Musician: What All Musicians Must Know to Succeed by Sheila E. Anderson, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., Jul 1, 2005