Mike Block

Last updated
Mike Block
Mike Block.jpg
Mike Block plays the cello
Background information
Birth nameMichael Glen Block
Born (1982-05-25) May 25, 1982 (age 41)
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Genres Classical, folk, jazz, bluegrass, rock, pop
Occupation(s)Musician, composer, arranger
Instrument(s)Cello, voice
Years active2006–present
Website mikeblockmusic.com

Michael Glen Block (born May 25, 1982) is an American cellist, singer, composer, and arranger. [1]

Contents

Career

Block has worked with Yo-Yo Ma, Bobby McFerrin, Lenny Kravitz, Shakira, The National, Joe Zawinul, Alison Krauss, Rachel Barton Pine, and Mark O'Connor. [2] Block plays with the Silk Road Ensemble. [3] In January, 2014, Block married fiddler and composer Hanneke Cassel. [4] He attended Cleveland Institute of Music (B.M. 2004) [5] and The Juilliard School. [6] He has played second cello alongside Yo-Yo Ma. [7] He also performed in Mark O'Connor's Appalachia Waltz trio for three years. [8] Block has served as musical director for Yo-Yo Ma, Bobby McFerrin, Lil' Buck Sinegal, Bill Irwin, Marcus Printup, The Silk Road Ensemble, and The Knights.

Camps and teaching

In 2009 he founded the Mike Block String Camp in Vero Beach, Florida. Teachers provide instruction in multiple traditions, develop improvisational skills, and coach student bands to prepare for performances. [9] In 2012 Block started the Brooklyn Pop String Camp in New York City to nurture children's passion for playing music. [10] In 2012, Block was appointed Associate Professor of Music at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. [11] He has presented at Stanford University, Princeton University, Harvard University, New York University, Berklee College of Music, Cleveland Institute of Music, New England Conservatory, Belmont University, Southern Methodist University, Sam Houston State University, Illinois State University, Illinois Wesleyan University, and University of Arkansas. In 2006, he received Suzuki method certification in music education from the New York City-based School for Strings, under Pamela Devenport. [12] From 2009 to 2012, he was the Lead Teaching Artist for Silk Road Connect, a partnership between the Silk Road Project and schools in New York City and Boston. [13] In 2015 he began teaching cello online through the ArtistWorks music education website. [14]

Other work

From 2011–2012, he was the Artistic Director and host of GALA Brooklyn: "Global Art - Local Art:", a Music Festival in Brooklyn. [15] Block started the Vero Beach International Music Festival in 2014, which features performances by students and faculty of the Mike Block String Camp. [16] He has appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien , National Public Radio's St. Paul Sunday, Regis and Kelly , VH1, the Disney Channel, WNBC-TV with Chuck Scarborough, and the CBS Early Show . [17] He worked with director Yaron Zilberman as a music consultant for A Late Quartet, a 2011 movie starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Christopher Walken. [18]

Collaborations

Personal life

Block was struck by a Manhattan taxi in 2009, with injuries that required multiple surgeries.

He currently lives in Boston with his wife and young daughter.

Discography

With Rez Abbasi

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yo-Yo Ma</span> American cellist (born 1955)

Yo-Yo Ma is an American cellist. Born and partially raised in Paris to Chinese parents and educated in New York City, he was a child prodigy, performing from the age of four and a half. He graduated from the Juilliard School and Harvard University, attended Columbia University, and has performed as a soloist with orchestras around the world. He has recorded more than 92 albums and received 19 Grammy Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Evan Ziporyn</span> American composer

Evan Ziporyn is an American composer of post-minimalist music with a cross-cultural orientation, drawing equally from classical music, avant-garde, various world music traditions, and jazz. Ziporyn has composed for a wide range of ensembles, including symphony orchestras, wind ensembles, many types of chamber groups, and solo works, sometimes involving electronics. Balinese gamelan, for which he has composed numerous works, has compositions. He is known for his solo performances on clarinet and bass clarinet; additionally, Ziporyn plays gender wayang and other Balinese instruments, saxophones, piano & keyboards, EWI, and Shona mbira.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rushad Eggleston</span> American musician and composer

Rushad Robert Eggleston is an American cellist, composer, jazz vocalist, & performer. Eggleston's music can be eccentric, with many references to fantasy and goblins. Eggleston is known for inventing words, and for his imaginative world called The Land of Sneth.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Darol Anger</span> American violinist

Darol Robert Anger is an American violinist and founding member of The David Grisman Quintet.

Mark Summer is the original cellist of the Turtle Island Quartet; he is a co-founder of the quartet and performed with Turtle Island from its founding in 1985 until the fall of 2015.

Silkroad, formerly the Silk Road Project, Inc., is a not-for-profit organization, initiated by the cellist Yo-Yo Ma in 1998, promoting collaboration among artists and institutions, promoting multicultural artistic exchange, and studying the ebb and flow of ideas. The project was first inspired by the cultural traditions of the historical Eurasian Silk Road trade routes and now encompasses a number of artistic, cultural and educational programs focused on connecting people and ideas from around the world. It has been described as an "arts and educational organization that connects musicians, composers, artists and audiences around the world" and "an initiative to promote multicultural artistic collaboration."

Discography for the cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vijay Iyer</span> American composer, pianist, bandleader, producer, and writer

Vijay Iyer is an American composer, pianist, bandleader, producer and writer based in New York City. The New York Times has called him a "social conscience, multimedia collaborator, system builder, rhapsodist, historical thinker and multicultural gateway". Iyer received a 2013 MacArthur Fellowship, a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, a United States Artists Fellowship, a Grammy nomination, and the Alpert Award in the Arts. He was voted Jazz Artist of the Year in the DownBeat magazine international critics' polls in 2012, 2015, 2016, and 2018. In 2014, he received a lifetime appointment as the Franklin D. and Florence Rosenblatt Professor of the Arts at Harvard University, where he was jointly appointed in the Department of Music and the Department of African and African American Studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bruce Molsky</span>

Bruce C. Molsky is an American fiddler, banjo player, guitarist, and singer. He primarily performs old-time music of the Appalachian region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emanuel Ax</span> American pianist, music professor (1949)

Emanuel "Manny"Ax is a Grammy-winning American classical pianist. He is known for his chamber music collaborations with cellist Yo-Yo Ma and violinists Isaac Stern and Young Uck Kim, as well as his piano recitals and performances with major orchestras in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Matt Glaser</span> American bluegrass and jazz violinist

Matt Glaser is an American jazz and bluegrass violinist. He served as the chair of the string department at the Berklee College of Music for more than twenty-five years. He is now the founder and artistic director of Berklee's American Roots Music Program.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Damian Woetzel</span> American dancer

Damian Woetzel is an American choreographer.

Octavio Brunetti was a pianist, arranger and composer from Argentina. He was best known for his participation in the album Te amo tango by Raul Jaurena, which won the Latin Grammy Award for Best Tango Album in 2007, and was one of the most sought after tango pianists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rachel Barton Pine</span> American violinist (born 1974)

Rachel Barton Pine is an American violinist. She debuted with the Chicago Symphony at age 10, and was the first American and youngest ever gold medal winner of the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition. The Washington Post wrote that she "displays a power and confidence that puts her in the top echelon."

Wendy Warner is a cellist from Chicago, Illinois. She performs both as a soloist with major orchestras and as a chamber musician around the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turtle Island Quartet</span> American string quartet

The Turtle Island Quartet is a string quartet that plays hybrids of jazz, classical, and rock music. The group was formed in 1985 by David Balakrishnan, Darol Anger, and Mark Summer in San Francisco. They released their first album on Windham Hill Records in 1988 with Irene Sazer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sandeep Das</span> Indian Tabla player and composer

Sandeep Das is an Indian tabla player and composer currently based in Boston, Massachusetts, United States.

<i>Silent City</i> (album) 2008 studio album by Kayhan Kalhor and Brooklyn Rider

Silent City is an album by New York City-based string quartet, Brooklyn Rider and Iranian musician Kayhan Kalhor, released by World Village Records in 2008.

Eric Jacobsen is an American conductor and cellist. He is currently a member of The Knights, and the Silk Road Project, and is the Music Director of the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and Virginia Symphony Orchestra, Principal Conductor of the Greater Bridgeport Symphony, and when was an artistic partner of the Northwest Sinfonietta from 2015-2018

Brinton Averil Smith is an American cellist.

References

  1. "Cellist & Composer Mike Block Reinvents Concert Series at Brooklyn Lyceum". BroadwayWorld.com. 18 March 2011. Retrieved 29 March 2019.
  2. Battaglia, Andy (May 6, 2011). "A Brooklyn Buffet: Local Cellist Launches New Music Fest". Wall St Journal.
  3. "The Silk Road Project: Mike Block". Silk Road Project. Archived from the original on 2014-05-21. Retrieved 2011-12-05.
  4. [ dead link ]
  5. "Cellist Mike Block recital Nov. 9". Illinois State University.
  6. "Student Artist Spotlight: Adrianne Ngam '13". The Cornell Daily Sun.
  7. "Yo-Yo Ma, Silk Road Ensemble return to Mondavi". The Davis Enterprise. 30 March 2011.
  8. "Appalachia Waltz Trio to Perform Friday, Jan. 18". Phillips Academy Andover.
  9. "Mike Block String camp". Mike Block.
  10. "BPSC". Mike Block.
  11. "Berklee - Mike Block". Berklee.
  12. "The Knights: Mike Block". The Knights.
  13. "Silk Road Connect". Silk Road Project. Archived from the original on 2013-03-06.
  14. "ArtistWorks Engages Esteemed Cellist for Multi-Style Cello Online Teaching". Businesswire.com. August 11, 2015.
  15. "GALA Brooklyn". GALA NYC.
  16. "VBIMF". VBIMF.
  17. "Founder: Mike Block". GALA NYC.
  18. "Founder: Mike Block". Mikeblockmusic.com.
  19. "Grammy Award-Winner Mike Block Performs with Biribá Union". The Enterprise.
  20. "Duo with Darol Anger". Darol Anger.
  21. "Duo with Hanneke Cassel". Hanneke Cassel.
  22. "Sandeep Das". Rachel Barton-Pine.
  23. "Duo with Balla Kouyate". Club Passim.
  24. "Rachel Barton". Rachel Barton-Pine.
  25. "Duo with Clay Ross". Clay Ross.
  26. "Duo with Yang Wei". Pipa Sensation.
  27. "Duo with Derek Gripper". Derek Gripper.

Sources