Two Dana grads in Pittsburgh orchestra

By ROBERT ROLLIN

VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT

YOUNGSTOWN — The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra — acclaimed as one of the top five orchestras in the world — is coming to Youngstown Thursday, and bringing with it two Ohio-born Dana School of Music graduates: Jeffrey Grubbs and Micah Howard.

Grubbs and Howard are veteran string-bass section members who have been in the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra for more than a decade and have also served on the Dana faculty.

Grubbs grew up in Cleveland near Garfield Heights and moved to Wickliffe during high school. He started studying music at age 9, tried some wind instruments, and played violin in the Lakeland Community College Orchestra until picking up a string bass to help his director. “I also got interested in jazz early and played in the Jazz Band at Lakeland,” Grubbs said. There were no musicians in his family, as his parents and sister were involved in the medical field.

Busy performer

At Dana, Grubbs again served in both classical and jazz groups, studying with bass teacher and jazz ensemble director Tony Leonardi. After stints in the Atlanta Symphony and the Florida Philharmonic, Grubbs was hired at Pittsburgh in 1996 and immediately went on a world tour with the orchestra under Lorin Maazel. In 2006, Grubbs was hired by the University of Illinois as associate professor with immediate tenure to direct the jazz program. He returns to the Pittsburgh Symphony this fall and will be teaching at the University of Pittsburgh.

Micah Howard was born in Steubenville to a musical family. His mother, Patricia, plays violin, viola and piano, and his father, Walter, is a piano tuner. His grandfather was a composer and arranger in Italy. His brothers and sister are all string players. The family was an orchestra-program mainstay during its years at Dana.

Howard started piano at age 4, and soon studied clarinet, saxophone, trumpet and violin.

“When my father brought home a string bass with the idea of trying it himself, I immediately became fascinated, refused to let it go, and played it until the next morning,” Howard said.

After graduating Dana, Howard went on to a masters at Duquesne University, won the International Society of Bassists Competition in 1995, and was hired at the Pittsburgh Symphony in 1996.

He has performed the Koussevitsky Bass Concerto as soloist with the Orchestra, is constantly involved with chamber music, and has a full load of private students at Duquesne.

The Thursday evening show will be conducted by Yan Pascal Tortelier, the talented Pittsburgh Symphony principal guest conductor and conductor laureate of the BBC Philharmonic. The program will include the Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique, one of the great landmarks of Romantic program music; the tremendously popular Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto to be played by Russian pianist Alexander Toradze; and the Mozart Overture to Cosi Fan Tutte.