Dorian Wind Quintet

Recognized by critics, audiences, and colleagues alike for its polished and passionate performances, the Dorian Wind Quintet is known worldwide as one of chamber music’s preeminent and longest continuously-active ensembles. The Quintet has traveled around the world – concertizing in 48 of the 50 United States and Canada, touring Europe eighteen times, and playing throughout the Middle East, India, Africa and Asia. The Dorian made history in 1981, as the first wind quintet to appear at Carnegie Hall. Since its inception at Tanglewood in 1961, the Dorian has collaborated with many of the most transcendent and legendary artists in the world of classical music during the 20th and 21st centuries. To date, the Dorian is responsible for nearly 40 commissions of 20th and 21st century wind music from major composers, including: Luciano Berio, Joan Tower, Mario Davidovsky, Bruce Adolphe, Lukas Foss, Jacob Druckman, Billy Childs, Lee Hoiby, David Del Tredici, Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, and George Perle. The Dorian Quintet’s commission of George Perle’s Wind Quintet No. 4 won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1986, making history as the first Pulitzer ever awarded for a wind quintet. The group has recorded on the Vox, CRI, Serenus, New World, and Summit Records labels. During their April 16th performance on the University of Dayton’s ArtsLIVE Series, the Dorian Wind Quintet will perform a World Premier by composer Jessica Meyer. Jessica Meyer is a GRAMMY® – nominated violist and composer whose passionate musicianship radiates accessibility and emotional clarity. Her first composer/performer portrait album in 2019 debuted at #1 on the Billboard traditional classical chart, where “knife-edge anticipation opens on to unexpected, often ecstatic musical realms, always with a personal touch and imaginatively written for the instruments” (Gramophone Magazine). Meyer’s compositions viscerally explore the wide palette of emotionally expressive colors available to each instrument while using traditional and extended techniques inspired by her varied experiences as a contemporary and period instrumentalist.