Photo courtesy of G B Robertson
Known for performing “with precision and an impressive attention to timbral detail” (Boston Musical Intelligencer), percussionist Jeff Stern has developed a voice to listen for in today’s contemporary music scene. He has performed extensively throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia, and has collaborated with and championed the work of a number of the world’s preeminent composers. Recent premieres include Alejandro Viñao’s Stress and Flow with The Percussion Collective, James Wood’s Secret Dialogues for solo marimba, and John Luther Adams’ Sila at Lincoln Center’s Out of Doors Festival. As a proponent for the music of our time, Jeff also actively commissions works by composers of his generation, such as Michael Laurello, Thomas Kotcheff, Emma O’Halloran, Robert Honstein, and Juri Seo.
Jeff is the executive director, co-artistic director, and founding percussionist of 2 piano/2 percussion group icarus Quartet. Winner of the 2019 Chamber Music Yellow Springs Competition, icarus is quickly gaining the attention of composers, presenters, and audiences everywhere. They have been artists in residence for programs including Chamber Music Northwest’s Protégé Project, the Vienna Summer Music Festival, Bowling Green State University’s Klinger ElectroAcoustic Residency, and the DMV Music Academy held at the Kennedy Center’s REACH. The Quartet’s debut commercial album, BIG THINGS, featuring the music of Michael Laurello, Brad Lubman, and Paul Lansky was released on Furious Artisans records in June 2022, receiving praise from the Wall Street Journal as “a beautifully immersive recording…an impressive calling card.”
With The Percussion Collective, Jeff has toured the United States, performed on a live broadcast for WXQR’s Midday Masterpieces, and given a featured evening performance at the Percussive Arts Society International Convention. He joined the Collective in March 2022 for Chris Theofanidis’ Drum Circles concerto for four percussionists with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra under the baton of JoAnn Falletta, followed by two Drum Circles performances to open The Florida Orchestra’s 2023-24 season with resident music director, Michael Francis. With his various Collective colleagues, representing some of the brightest stars in modern percussion, Jeff has given two world premieres by Emmy Award-winning composer Garth Neustadter, two world premieres by Alejandro Viñao, and premieres of works for solo violin and percussion quartet by Ke-Chia Chen and Kenji Bunch at the Kennedy Center with virtuoso violinist Paul Huang.
Jeff is a frequent guest collaborator with new music ensembles around the country including NOVUS NY, Akropolis Reed Quintet (MI), Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra (CA), Mind on Fire (MD), NewPrism Ensemble (DC), NakedEye Ensemble (PA), and ensemble mise-en (NY), with whom he toured Hong Kong in 2018. He has appeared at the Yellow Barn Music Festival, Bang on a Can Summer Festival, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Lake George Music Festival, and the Eighth Blackbird Creative Lab, and can be heard on the Albany, Elm City, Bright Shiny Things, figureight, Furious Artisans, and Cantaloupe record labels.
In the 2024-25 season, Jeff will appear with icarus Quartet on the Secrest Artist Series in Winston-Salem, NC to premiere three companion works to Bartók’s Sonata for two pianos and percussion written expressly for iQ by Martin Bresnick, Viet Cuong, and Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Higdon. He will also join The Percussion Collective to open the Phoenix Symphony’s season as concerto soloists in three performances with Colombian-American conductor Lina Gonzalez-Granados. Other 2024-25 season highlights include collaborations with AMOC* with conductor/composer Matthew Aucoin and MacArthur Genius director Peter Sellars, saxophone quartet Project Fusion, pianist Natalia Kazaryan and yMusic cellist Gabriel Cabezas, and Icelandic cosmic rock band Sigur Rós.
Jeff has served on the percussion faculty at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University since 2017, and has taught at the Luzerne Music Center since 2022. He holds a B.M. from UMass Amherst, an M.M. from the Peabody Conservatory, where he was awarded the Harold Randolph Prize in Performance, and an Artist Diploma from the Yale School of Music. Jeff is a proud artist endorser of Vic Firth sticks and mallets, Zildjian cymbals, Evans drumheads, and Pearl/Adams drums and percussion.
