Dr. Brian Hodges

Cellist Brian Hodges is an active soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. With his wife, pianist Betsi Hodges, he has given recitals across the US, Canada and Italy. They have premiered works by noted composers such as Lee Hoiby, David Biedenbender, Mark Olivieri, Carolyn Steinberg and were featured on a recording of the works of composer David H. Johnson. He has appeared as soloist with the Jackson Symphony Orchestra, the Boise Baroque Orchestra, the Boise State University Orchestra, and was the featured soloist with the Tuacahn Performing Arts High School Orchestra on their tour in Seattle. He has performed at the Idaho Bach Festival and was a featured guest artist at the 2011 Elizabeth Cowling Cello Festival in Greensboro, NC.

Brian is the principal cellist of the Boise Baroque Orchestra and performs regularly with Classical Revolution: Boise, which has been featured at the Idaho Shakespeare Festival and performed live on Radio Boise. He is a founding member of the Rothko Piano Trio, with Betsi Hodges on piano, and Jo Nardolillo on violin, which has performed nationwide and has commissioned several new works.

Originally from San Antonio, Texas, he soloed with the San Antonio Symphony as a winner of the Young Artists Competition. He went on to study at the Eastman School of Music earning his Bachelor of Music degree in cello performance and stayed on to complete his Master of Music degree in cello performance where he was the teaching assistant to Marcy Rosen. While at Eastman, he was the founding member of the Genesis String Quartet, which had several residencies in the U.S., including Roberts Wesleyan College and a rural residency in Madisonville, KY, where they performed for over 10,000 schoolchildren. He received his Doctor of Musical Arts in cello performance from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro where he was a member of the graduate piano trio in residence. Throughout his schooling, he participated in master classes with such cellists as Bernard Greenhouse, Steven Doane, Gary Hoffman, Nathaniel Rosen, and Jeanne Lamon of Tafelmusik.

Brian is currently Professor of Cello and Coordinator of Chamber Music at Boise State University in Boise, Idaho. Before joining the faculty at Boise State, he was on the faculties of the Townsend School of Music at Mercer University in Georgia, Spring Arbor University and Albion College and served as co-director of the Jackson Symphony String Academy in Jackson, MI. At UNCG, he was the administrative assistant for the Luigi Silva Centennial Cello Celebration and the Bernard Greenhouse Cello Celebration and performed at both festivals. He has given presentations at national American String Teachers Association conferences, as well as other regional and state conferences.

He is the co-author of Cello Secrets: Over 100 Performance Strategies for the Advanced Cellist published by Rowman & Littlefield (Amazon), and contributes regularly to The Strad magazine and website.

During the summers, he performs and teaches at the Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival, in Fairbanks, Alaska, and has been on the faculty at the Green Valley Chamber Music Festival in Las Vegas, the Summer Music Institute in San Antonio, TX, and the String Camp of Rochester. As a student, he attended such festivals as Aspen, Interlochen, Roundtop, the Quartet Program at Bucknell University, the Heidelberg Castle Opera Festival in Heidelberg, Germany, the Thy International Chamber Music Festival in Denmark, the Hampden-Sydney Chamber Music Festival in Virginia and the Banff Centre for the Arts in Banff, Canada.

As a chamber musician, he has appeared as guest cellist with the Penderecki String Quartet, performed with the Kandinsky Piano Trio, the Chimera Duo, and has been coached by members of the Cleveland Quartet, Shanghai Quartet, Amadeus Quartet, Ying Quartet, St. Lawrence Quartet, Brentano Quartet, Beaux Arts Trio, and the Guild Piano Trio.

His teachers and mentors have included Brooks Whitehouse, Pamela Frame, Alan Harris, Marcy Rosen, Mary Ruth Leonard, Paul Katz, Ron Leonard, and Eleanor Schoenfeld. He studied viola da gamba and early music with Paul O’Dette, Christel Thielmann, Mark Cudek and Ann-Marie Morgan.

He performs on a Carlo Galbusera cello, circa 1828.

Spiegel im Spiegel

Live performance
Boise State University
Faculty Chamber Recital
October 9, 2014