Bassoonist Michael Harley enjoys a diverse career as a teacher, performer, and music advocate. At the University of South Carolina he teaches bassoon, coaches chamber music, and is artistic director of the award-winning Southern Exposure New Music Series. Past full-time teaching positions include posts at Ohio University, Wright State University, and Goshen College. His performances have been called “spectacular” (Washington Post) and “exquisite” (Columbus Dispatch).
A proponent of contemporary music, Michael Harley is a founding member of the Grammy-winning ensemble Alarm Will Sound, called “new music luminaries” and “one of the most vital and original ensembles on the American musical scene” (New York Times). He has worked with and premiered pieces by many of today’s most distinguished composers, including Pulitzer-winners John Adams, John Luther Adams, David Lang, Roger Reynolds, Steve Reich, and Charles Wuorinen; and Derek Bermel, David Biedenbender, Harrison Birtwistle, Caleb Burhans, Viet Cuong, Donnacha Dennehy, Stefan Freund, Michael Gordon, David T. Little, Meredith Monk, Nico Muhly (premiering and recording Muhly’s bassoon concerto, Reliable Sources), Wolfgang Rihm, John Fitz Rogers, Kate Soper, Tyshawn Sorey, Augusta Read Thomas, and Ken Ueno. A versatile musician, he has been featured as a soloist with AWS both as a bassoonist and singer. He appears on more than 25 albums, recorded on the Nonesuch, Cantaloupe, New Amsterdam, Innova, Bedroom Community, Centaur, and Sweetspot record labels. His album with pianist Phillip Bush, Come Closer, was released in 2017.
As a recitalist, chamber, and orchestral musician, Mike has played in diverse venues on five continents, ranging from nightclubs and bars (Le Poisson Rouge and the Roxy in NYC) to Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Barbican (London), Musiekgebouw aan ‘t IJ (Amsterdam), Town Hall in Johannesburg, South Africa, Glinka Hall (Moscow) and the Hermitage Theatre (St. Petersburg); and with artists including the indie rock group Dirty Projectors, the jazz trio Medeski, Martin and Wood, Dance Heginbotham, the orchestras of Charleston, Columbus, Fort Wayne, South Bend, Augusta, the South Carolina Philharmonic, and the Long Bay Symphony (Myrtle Beach). Festivals and conference performances include Lucca Opera Theater (Italy), Piccolo Spoleto, Music on the Hill Rhode Island, Mizzou New Music, Kent Blossom, the International College Music Society conference in Beunos Aires, Argentina, and numerous International Double Reed Society conferences. Mike served on the faculty of the Interlochen Arts Camp in Interlochen, MI, and the Saarburger Serenaden International Music Festival and School in Saarburg, Germany. He is co-director of the NewBassoon Institute, which focuses for a week each summer on contemporary bassoon repertoire and techniques (including at NMF in the summers of 2018 and 2019!)
Mike has degrees from the Eastman School of Music (D.M.A.), where he was awarded the Performer’s Certificate, the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (M.M.), and Goshen College (B.A., English and music). His teachers include John Hunt, William Winstead, Gwendolyn Rose, and Sharon Trent. He lives in Columbia, SC with his wife, NMF flute mentor Jennifer Parker-Harley, and daughters Ella and Lucia.
