Dr. Erik Larson is the Principal Oboist for the Opera Theatre Orchestra of Alabama and also the Carolina International Orchestra. He is an associate professor of music at the University of West Alabama where he chaired the Fine Arts Department for nine years. Previously, he was the Manhattan Chamber Philharmonic of New York’s Assistant Principal Oboist for six years. He has held positions as principal oboe for the Chicago 21st Century New Music Ensemble and Chicago Classical Symphony, among others, and also as Conductor and Music Director for the Soli Deo Gloria Chamber Singers and Chamber Players. He is a founding member of the West Alabama Chamber Symphony, and has held former faculty positions at Truman State University and The University of Alabama. Dr. Larson has appeared as a concerto soloist with the Carolina Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall, and performed at the Barbican Center in London, Symphony Center in Chicago, and other notable venues in sixteen other countries. He has performed under such conductors as Seiji Ozawa, Zubin Mehta, Vaclav Nelhybel, Joseph Silverstein, and Louis Lane, and in collaborative performances with musicians from the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, and the Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra. He is active as a recitalist, and frequently leads clinics and masterclasses in high schools in the Chicago, St. Louis, and Atlanta metro areas, and at universities including Northwestern University (October 2023), the University of Alabama (November 2023), James Madison University, New York University’s Steinhardt School of Music, the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, the University of Arkansas, and the University of Tennessee, among others. He has presented at the International Double Reed Society Conferences in Melbourne, Australia, and in Bangkok, Thailand. Dr. Larson can be heard as the oboe soloist on the soundtrack for the film, “The Eternal Return” (Inova), and on the world premier recording of Harald Genzmer’s “Trio for Oboe, Clarinet, and Bassoon” (Ries & Erler, Berlin – upcoming release). His teachers have included Ralph Gomberg (Principal Oboe Emeritus – Boston Symphony Orchestra), Ray Still (former Principal Oboe – Chicago Symphony Orchestra), and Mary Bailey (University of Alabama), with additional study under Elaine Douvas (Principal Oboe, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra of New York). Current research interests include the use of leitmotivs as plot development signals in later Wagner operas, and the application of gallant schemata in common practice period compositions.
Boston University, MusB / Northwestern University, MM and Certificate of Performance / University of Alabama, DMA.
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