Todd Brunel is a critically acclaimed clarinetist and sax player hailed as playing with "Tremendous virtuosity and heart" by the Boston Globe. He performs extensively as a classical and jazz musician and is a member of the Armenian folk jazz project Musaner, the Dylan Jack Quartet, Music At Eden's Edge, the Last Taxi, the Variable Density Sound Orchestra, the Eric Hofbauer Quintet, the Sonic Explorers and the avante-funk band, the Circadian Rhythm Kings. Fascinated by modern music and all its possibilities, he started the Vortex Series for New and Improvised Music in 2005 and has been awarded grants by the Cambridge, Somerville, Arlington and Massachusetts Cultural Council, Art Without Borders and the Dole Rogers Marshall visting artists program at Wheaton College. In 2012, he formed Opal Ensemble with pianist Paul Carlson and violist Anne Black, a group dedicating to discovering new 20th and 21st century repertoire and often neglected works of the past. Mr Brunel is often sought after as a soloist and collaborator to perform exciting cross genre classical and jazz programs. Some of his recent guest appearances include Gould Academy, Carnegie Hall, Brandeis University, The Longy School at Bard College, Spazio Teotro NO'HMA in Milan, the Out of the Box Festival and the Academy of Music Dance and Art in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. He performs regularly with several orchestras including the New Bedford Symphony, the Waltham Symphony, the Claflin Hill Symphony and the Lexington Symphony. He has recorded for PBS and the PARMA Label and has performed as principal clarinetist with ALEA III, the Bulgarian Virtuosi and Opera Ebony of Harlem. Mr Brunel is on the faulty of Wheaton College, where he directed the Wheaton College jazz band and is also on the faculties of the Powers Music School, The Community Music Center of Boston and the Lexington Music School. To find out more about Todd Brunel, visit him online at: www.clarinetconspiracy.com
Brunel studied composition at Boston University with Sam Headrick and has premiered compositions at Dartmouth College, Carey Hall in Lexington, MA and the Regent Theater in Arlington, MA. He holds an MM from the Brooklyn College Conservatory and a BM from the Boston Conservatory. He has attended the Aspen Music Festival, the University of North Texas and The Longy School as a scholarship recipient.
Specialties: Performance, education, composition, special event contracting, administrative, grant writing, improvisation, jazz, classical and world music performance, ensemble director, clinician.