This episode is sponsored by Dream Cymbals.

Photo of the trio by: Devin Barnes.

This week’s guest is Felix Reyes of the Pathos Trio. Born in Brentwood, New York, Felix is Managing Director of Pathos Trio and is a freelance percussionist living in Brooklyn, NY. He has performed all over the United States and abroad, including various countries such as El Salvador, Germany, Poland, Spain, Japan, and most recently became Artistic Director of international percussion group Symmetrio.

Graduated with his Master’s in Percussion Performance from Bowling Green State University, Felix studied percussion under Dr. Daniel Piccolo and marimba specialist Dr. Isabelle Huang. Furthering his emphasis on marimba performance, Felix also received a Diploma in Marimba Performance at the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Sengawa, Japan, where he studied with marimba legend/virtuoso Keiko Abe.

Since then Felix has performed all across NYC in venues such as Roulette Intermedium, National Sawdust, Kaufman Music Center, and made his solo Lincoln Center debut in May 2018 alongside Swiss percussion soloist Fabian Ziegler. Over the course of his career Felix has worked and collaborated with countless acclaimed international artists/composers including all members of Sō Percussion, Ney Rosauro, Michael Colgrass, Dai Fujikura, Jennifer Hidgon, Kaoru Watanabe, Christos Hatzis and Katarzyna Mycka.

His current activities outside of Pathos Trio include working as Studio Manager for Grammy Nominated Percussion Quartet Sandbox Percussion, working as a freelance Grant Writer for various NYC nonprofits, and preparing for upcoming performances in Spain for Summer 2022 with marimbist's Magdalena Myrczik (POL) and David Almagro Garcia (SPA). Felix is a proud endorser of Marimba One instruments, Sabian Cymbals, and Vic Firth sticks and mallets.

Happy Birthday!

Happy birthday to John Roesch. John is a professional foley artist that has worked in the film business for over 30 years. He was an actor at Radnor High School and attended the United States International University School for Preforming Arts in San Diego for one year. During that time, he, along with 3 other peers, created a short film called " Indian Magic is What You See". This won the San Diego Film Festival in 1972, Spring-boarding from there, he attended New York University and graduated with a BFA in Film. He then applied and was accepted to the American Film Institute as a Directing Fellow . As fate would have it, a fellow filmmaker asked if he could "help" with the sound on the film she was working on and that was his first taste of foley and he never looked back from there. He is a member of Local 700 , Motion Picture Sound Editors, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He still loves his job to this day. He credits much of his success to those he has met along the way.

Happy birthday to Gerald Myles. He is the founder, director, and premier drummer of GeraldMyles.com. Born and raised outside of New York City, he is the third generation of professional drummers. By the age of 15, Gerald began winning numerous regional and national awards for his playing abilities.has had an extensive playing career between playing for bands in the Magic Kingdom at Disney World to playing for the Cirque Du Soleil show, La Nouba, to playing for the ARMY Volunteers band. He now has a full teaching studio with state of the art equipment as well as creative methods of not only teaching, but keeping his studio booked with a waiting list. He still records and plays live as well as does clinics and masterclasses.

Happy Birthday to Mike Zellers. Mike currently serves as the Director of Percussion at Leander High School in Leander, TX. In addition to working with the high school students at Leander, Michael is also the percussion director at Running Brushy Middle School. Zellers received his Master in Music Performance from the University of Delaware and his Bachelor’s Degree from West Chester University.

Michael Zellers is currently the electronics designer for the Boston Crusaders Drum and Bugle corps form Boston, Massachusetts. Prior to joining Boston’s staff, Michael served on the percussion staff of The Cadets from 2011-2015. He served as a front ensemble technician from 2011-2013 and the Electronics designer from 2013-2015. During his time with The Cadets, the corps won their 10th DCI World Championship in 2011 and The Cadets Percussion section received the Fred Sanford Award for Best Percussion Performance in 2013. In addition to his most recent work with the Cadets, Zellers has worked with the Jersey Surf and Reading Buccaneers.

Happy Birthday to Eduardo Leandro. Eduardo teaches percussion at Stony Brook University in new York, where he is also the artistic director of its new music ensemble, the Contemporary Chamber Players. He taught at the Haute École de Musique de Genève and directed the percussion program at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst between 1999 and 2007. He has conducted some of the most important pieces of the twentieth century, including Schönberg’s Pierrot Lunaire and Chamber Symphony, Ligeti’s Piano and Chamber Concertos, Messiaen’s Exotic Birds, Xenakis’ Palimpsest, Boulez’s Derives I, and several premieres for mixed ensemble. He has also conducted great part of the percusion ensemble repertoire from Varèse’s Ionization onwards.

As a percussionist Eduardo Leandro has performed with ensembles such as the Steve Reich Ensemble, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and Bang-on-a-Can All Starts. He is part of the Percussion Duo Contexto, wich was an ensemble in residence at the Centre Internacional de Percussion in Geneva for ten years. He played regularly with Ensemble Champ d'Action in Belgium, with Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, and with Ensemble Contrechamps in Switzerland, under the direction of Pierre Boulez, Heinz Holliger, and David Robertson among others.

He has performed in music festivals throughout the world such as the Suita Music Festival in Osaka, Ferienkurse fur Neue Muzik Darmstadt, Festspiel in Salzburg, Ars Musica in Brussels, Archipel in Geneva, Nits de Altea in Spain, Espinho Music Meeting in Portugal, Izmir Music Festival in Turkey, Athenaeum Concert Series in Helsinki and Festival d'Automne in Paris.

He has won the New Music Contest in Dusseldorf, Germany, and the second prize in the Eldorado Competition in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He was a judge at the 2nd. International Marimba Competition in Osaka.

Eduardo Leandro was born in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. He attended the Sao Paulo State University, the Rotterdam Conservatory in the Netherlands, and Yale University, having studied percussion with John Boudler, Jan Pustjens, and Robert van Sice.

Gig Alerts

God’s Love, We Deliver is hosting their 5 annual fundraiser in the Love Rocks Concert on March 10th.

There are Job Openings as of 3/9/2022 for the Leander School District in the Music Department. See more details and APPLY HERE.

Damon will be giving a virtual percussion masterclass on March 24th at 7pm, sponsored by the CT, NY, NJ, and MA chapters of the Percussive Arts Society.

Educational Spotlight

Here are the artists and clinicians for the debut PAS Regional Day of Percussion for the West Region on April 30, 2022, in Fresno, CA. Enjoy a full day of percussion performances and clinics in multiple disciplines with your drum and percussion community, featuring…

Cindy Blackman-Santana, Drum set
Paoli Mejias, World
Tony Nuñez, Marching
Karl Perazzo, World
Dr. Dave Gerhart, FUNdamentals
Leigh Howard Stevens, Evening concert & clinic
Michael Burritt, Evening concert & masterclass

You can get MORE INFO HERE.

Iconic Recording

The iconic recording this week is Keiko Abe performing The Wave Impressions at the Emilio Rabasa theater. Recorded by Dante Euler Tuxtla Gutierrez, Mexico. 11th Festival Internacional de Marimbistas in 2011.

Music News

Last year, Apple purchased the classical music streaming service Primephonic. Primephonic offered advanced categorization for classical music albums, which was a huge boon to fans of the genre. Apple said at the time that the features available in Primephonic would eventually become a part of Apple Music. -Article

More than a few artists (and other entertainment professionals) have scheduled tours for 2022 after most crowd-based happenings were shelved in 2020 and 2021. But fans only have so many dollars – and free evenings – to spend on live events, and Live Nation is now taking steps to offload tickets at reduced prices. -Article

Want to support the people in Ukraine? Here's how you can help -Article

Felix Reyes Interview

The song leading into the interview is Distance Between Places, by Alan Hankers Performed by Pathos Trio.

The other members of the trio are Marcelina Suchocka, who is also a fourth-year Percussion Fellow at the New World Symphony and Alan Hankers who is a composer and pianist.

Felix talks about rehearsing and receiving new works, via charts and midi stems.

Felix came to percussion in high school via the marching band program and heavy metal. He recounts the preparation for his audition and joining the percussion studio.

Felix attended SUNY Fredonia for undergrad and Bowling Green State University for his masters.

Felix was a member of the Sunrisers Drum and Bugle Corps.

Felix studied with Keiko Abe.

Shout-out to Jean Geoffroy of the Conservatorie de Lyon.

Felix also studied Mexican Marimba and a little Gyil.

After Felix got his masters, he moved back to Brooklyn and interned with the guys in So Percussion.

Felix is also the studio manager for the Sandbox Percussion Ensemble.

Felix does a lot of the grant writing for Pathos. This is the funding for artists that Damon mentions.

The Pathos Trio is releasing a new album called “When Dark Sounds Collide”, and they are doing a release shown Miami on Monday, March 14 at the New World Center, with the album available to the general public on March 18.

You can WATCH THE LIVESTREAM HERE.

The album is five brand new works that combine contemporary classical music with dark, heavy sounds borrowed from other genres.

To enhance the album experience, each work has an accompanying music video, created by Grammy-nominated film company Four/Ten Media.

The trio did some workshopping at Avaloch Farm in New Hampshire.

The Trio offers different educational programs as well as performances, including:

HOW TO RUN A CHAMBER MUSIC ENSEMBLE

As an artist-run ensemble, we understand how daunting of a task it is to build an organization from the ground up. Whether it includes talking about managing a chamber ensemble, artistic planning, how to form an organization (LLC, nonprofit, etc.) fundraising/finances, or talking about the production side of setting up your own concerts, we offer lectures to where we can cover giving insight to these topics and more.

MASTERCLASSES

Whether it’s talking about solo or chamber music playing, we offer masterclasses and coachings for students on any instrument from High School to Collegiate Level.

OPEN REHEARSALS/DEMONSTRATIONS

From leading an audience through our rehearsal process, to answering questions regarding our commissioned repertoire, we offer open rehearsals and demonstrations of our music to those interested in getting an introduction to how our group operates and performs as a unit and more.

EDUCATIONAL WORKSHOPS/PERFORMANCES

At the core of our mission, we strongly believe in giving back to our communities and those we perform for. From talking to collegiate/graduate levels students, to visiting middle school and high school students, Pathos Trio offers interactive educational workshops and performances for students of all ages.

Felix talks about how they work with composers and commission works to be performed.

Felix talks about backline and instrument rental.

Felix picked the iconic recording (Keiko Abe). He also selects some metal bands, Animals as Leaders and Between the Buried and Me. Shout-out to Blake Richardson.

Shout-out to the Sandbox guys, Vic Firth Sticks and Mallets, Marimba One Instruments, Eric Cha-Beach from So Percussion, and the fans!

You can follow Felix on his Website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, as well as the Pathos Trio on their Website, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

The song leading out of the interview is "Fiction of Light" by Evan Chapman.