Robert Brink

Last updated

Robert Greenleaf Brink (Boston, 30 March 1924 - Boston, 24 October 2014) [1] was an American violinist, conductor, and educator. [2] He was a professor of music at the New England Conservatory in Boston, Massachusetts.

He performed with the harpsichordist Daniel Pinkham and gave the premieres of works by Walter Piston, Henry Cowell, Alan Hovhaness, and Daniel Pinkham. [3] Pinkham composed his 1958 violin concerto for Brink.

He performed in the United States, Canada, and Europe, and played under the conductors Sergei Koussevitzky, Aaron Copland, and Darius Milhaud. With Daniel Pinkham, Brink co-founded the Cambridge Festival Orchestra in the mid-1950s, serving as that orchestra's concertmaster. In 1951 and 1952, Brink and Pinkham performed at Brown University and Wellesley college under the auspices of the Peabody Mason Concerts. [4] [5] Brink founded the Boston Classical Orchestra and served as its concertmaster until 1995. He founded and conducted the Orchestra for the Art of Music (OAM), which performs music from the Classical period.

He lived for many years in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts.

Related Research Articles

Orchestra Large instrumental ensemble

An orchestra is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including

Charles Munch (conductor)

Charles Munch was an Alsatian French symphonic conductor and violinist. Noted for his mastery of the French orchestral repertoire, he was best known as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

New England Conservatory of Music Oldest independent private school of music in the United States

The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the oldest independent music conservatory in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world. The conservatory is located on Huntington Avenue of the Arts near Boston Symphony Hall and is home to 750 students pursuing undergraduate and graduate studies, along with 1400 more in its Preparatory School as well as the School of Continuing Education. NEC offers bachelor's degrees with majors in classical performance, contemporary improvisation, composition, jazz, musicology, and music theory. The conservatory offers additional graduate degrees in accompaniment, conducting, and vocal pedagogy. Also offered are five-year joint double-degree programs with Harvard University and Tufts University. The New England Conservatory's faculty and alumni, which comprise nearly fifty percent of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, include 6 members of l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, 14 Rome Prize recipients, 51 Guggenheim Fellows, and prizewinners at nearly every major respected music forum in the world. As of January 2020, 11 MacArthur Fellows have been affiliated as faculty or alumni.

Longy School of Music of Bard College

Longy School of Music of Bard College is a private music school in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1915 as the Longy School of Music, it was one of the four independent degree-granting music schools in the Boston region along with the New England Conservatory, Berklee College of Music, and Boston Conservatory. In 2012, the institution merged with Bard College to become Longy School of Music of Bard College. As of the 2018–19 academic year, the conservatory has 300 students in its degree programs from 35 states and 23 countries.

Daniel Pinkham American composer

Daniel Rogers Pinkham, Jr. was an American composer, organist, and harpsichordist.

Kenneth Amis is a Bermudian tuba player best known for his association with the Empire Brass. He is also the assistant conductor of the MIT Wind Ensemble, a group he has been involved with since its creation in 1999. In addition, as of 2005, Amis is an Affiliated Artist of MIT.

James David Christie is an American classical organist and teacher. Until accusations of sexual misconduct emerged in August 2018, he was Chair and Professor of Organ at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Distinguished Artist in Residence at the College of the Holy Cross, and College Organist at Wellesley College. He has been a frequent organist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra since 1978, and has made several commercial recordings. Former employers include Boston Conservatory of Music, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, and Boston University.

Donald Palma is a prominent classical double bassist, conductor, bass instructor, and educator of ensemble performance. He is a native of New York City, and is a graduate of the Juilliard School. Palma studied with several noted bassists including Frederick Zimmermann, Robert Brennand, Orin O'Brien, and Homer Mensch.

Michael Gandolfi American composer

Michael James Gandolfi is an American composer of contemporary classical music. He chairs the composition department at the New England Conservatory of Music (NEC).

San Antonio Symphony

The San Antonio Symphony is a full-time professional symphony orchestra based in San Antonio, Texas. Its season runs from late September to early June. Sebastian Lang-Lessing, whose tenure ended in 2020, is Music Director Emeritus.

New England String Ensemble was founded in 1993 by violinist Peter Stickel and cellist John Bumstead to champion strings in performance and education and is one of the country's leading professional string orchestras. The ensemble consists of 26 professional string musicians who perform four concert programs a year at both the Rogers Center for the Arts in North Andover, Massachusetts and New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall in Boston, Massachusetts. It is led by conductor and music director, Federico Cortese, and performs music from the 17th century to the present.

Daniel George Lewis was an American orchestral conductor and University Professor Emeritus at the University of Southern California (USC).

Ruth Pierce Posselt was an American violinist and educator.

Richard Burgin was a Polish-American violinist, best known as associate conductor and the concertmaster of the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO).

Lorna Cooke deVaron was an American choral conductor. She was one of the pre-eminent choral conductors of the 20th century, having given the world premiere or American premiere of many important works by Benjamin Britten, Leonard Bernstein, Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, Irving Fine, Gunther Schuller, Daniel Pinkham, and others. DeVaron founded the New England Conservatory Chorus, which she directed from 1947 to 1988.

Randall Hodgkinson is an acclaimed American pianist. He won the International American Music Competition in 1981 which was sponsored by Carnegie Hall and the Rockefeller Foundation. He was also a winner in the J.S.Bach International Competition and received the Tanglewood Music Center's Cabot Award in 1971. Hodgkinson made his European orchestral debut in 1985 with the Santa Cecilia Orchestra of Rome. Later in 1986, he made his formal New York recital debut at Alice Tully Hall. He has performed as a soloist with numerous orchestras including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Concord Orchestra, the Iceland Philharmonic, the Orchestra of Santa Cecilia in Rome, and had successful collaborations with Leonard Bernstein and Gunther Schuller. He was a featured artist on the Bosendorfer Concert Series aired over WNYC – FM in New York City and has recorded for the Albany, Nonesuch, CRI and New World labels.

Conductorless orchestra Instrumental ensemble that functions as an orchestra but is not led or directed by a conductor

The conductorless orchestra, sometimes referred to as a self-conducted orchestra or unconducted orchestra, is an instrumental ensemble that functions as an orchestra but is not led or directed by a conductor. Most conductorless orchestras are smaller in size, and generally perform chamber orchestra repertoire. Several conductorless orchestras are made up of only strings and focus primarily on string orchestra repertoire. Conductorless orchestras generally come from the classical music tradition and perform standard repertoire, but many conductorless orchestras promote or specialise in contemporary classical music repertoire. Many contemporary classical music ensembles also regularly perform without a conductor.

Laura Anne Bossert is a violinist, violist, and pedagogue. She is a current faculty member at the Longy School of Music of Bard College and Wellesley College and, during the summer, the Castleman Quartet Program. She is co-director and founder of LyricaFest in Lincoln, Massachusetts.

Black conductors

Black conductors are musicians of African, Caribbean, African-American ancestry and other members of the African diaspora who are musical ensemble leaders who direct classical music performances, such as an orchestral or choral concerts, or jazz ensemble big band concerts by way of visible gestures with the hands, arms, face and head. Conductors of African descent are rare, as the vast majority are male and Caucasian.

Riccardo Minasi is an Italian violinist and conductor in the field of historically informed performance.

References

  1. ROBERT G. BRINK: Obituary, The Boston Globe
  2. Alfred Victor Frankenstein; Sigmund Gottfried Spaeth; John Townsend Hinton Mize (1951). The International who is who in Music. Who is Who in Music, Incorporated. p. 85.
  3. New England Conservatory faculty
  4. The Evening Bulletin, 7-Nov-1951, Ruth Tripp, "Daniel Pinkham, Robert Brink offer first in Corelli series", Providence
  5. The Townsman, 24-Jan-1952, "College Corelli concerts notable", Wellesley