Full Name
Steve Vacchi
First Name
Steve
Last Name
Vacchi
Affiliation
Faculty
Title
Associate Dean of Faculty Affairs
Additional Title
Professor of Bassoon and Chamber Music
Phone
541-346-3748
Office
364 Frohnmayer Music Bldg
City
Eugene
Departments
Music
Programs, Research and Outreach
Music Performance
Woodwinds
Interests
Winds, Bassoon, Chamber Music, Music Performance
Profile Section
Education
- DMA 1997, Bassoon Performance/Theory minor, Louisiana State University
- MMus 1993, Bassoon Performance, The Hartt School
- BMus 1990, Bassoon Performance, Eastman School of Music
Biography
Steve Vacchi is professor of bassoon and Associate Dean of faculty affairs at the University of Oregon School of Music and Dance. His teachers have included C. Robert Reinert, Rebecca Eldredge, Matthew Ruggiero, K. David Van Hoesen, Stephen Maxym, Frank Morelli, and William Ludwig. He holds degrees in performance from the Eastman School of Music (B.M. with high distinction/Performer’s Certificate), The Hartt School (M.M.), and Louisiana State University (D.M.A.), where he held a Board of Regents Fellowship. He also studied at the Yale School of Music. His dissertation is a “how-to” for bassoonists on fluttertongue and singing while playing; it focuses on five solo works requiring both techniques. A member of Pi Kappa Lambda and Phi Kappa Phi honor societies, he was formerly a faculty member at Wichita State University (KS) and the Brevard Music Center (NC). He has presented masterclasses at high schools, conservatories, and universities throughout the United States, South Korea, Thailand, and China, and served as a faculty sabbatical replacement at Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music in 2014-15.
Vacchi’s recording credits include 32 releases of wide-ranging solo, chamber, and large ensemble repertoire from J.S. Bach to the present. He has performed in 26 countries throughout Europe, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East, and the Caribbean. In the U.S., Vacchi has performed with The Florida and Sarasota Orchestras, Santa Fe ProMusica, the Rhode Island, Tulsa, Rochester, and Los Angeles Philharmonics, and the Saint Louis, New World, Baton Rouge, Colorado, Honolulu, Kansas City, Santa Rosa, New Haven, and Wichita Symphony Orchestras. He served as acting contrabassoonist/utility bassoonist of the Oregon Symphony during the 2019-20 season and continues as a regular extra with them. A member of the Eugene Symphony Orchestra, Oregon Bach Festival, and the Oregon Wind Quintet, he has been a featured soloist in works by Haydn, Mozart, Strauss, J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, Lindpaintner, Jurriaan Andriessen, Michael Daugherty, Walter Hartley, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Walter Mays, James Stephenson, and Peter Hope. An advocate of new music, Vacchi has performed 530 recently composed works, including 170 premieres. Vacchi has performed on many historical double reeds and continues to play heckelphone, contrabass sarrusophone, and contrabass clarinet professionally.
Publications
SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY
- UO Philharmonia/David Jacobs/Alex Dossin: George Walker, Piano Concerto https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=8.559942
- OrchestraNext/Brian McWhorter: Paul Safar, Orchestral Works 2023 https://www.orchestranext.com/paul-safar-orchestral-works/
- OrchestraNext/Brian McWhorter: Tchaikovsky, Nutcracker Ballet https://www.orchestranext.com/nutcracker/
- HyeRan Kim, lightwindyear
Korean Traditional Music Broadcasting Company - OrchestraNext/McWhorter: Bunch, The Snow Queen
Innova 977
http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/Name/Orchestra-Next/Ensemble/488274… - Van Dreel: New Millennium Music for Horn
Quadre Records QR181
https://www.discogs.com/Lydia-Van-Dreel-New-Millenium-Music-For-Horn/re… - Oregon Symphony Orchestra/Kalmar: Spirit of the American Range
Pentatone PTC 5186481
https://www.pentatonemusic.com/spirit-of-the-american-range-the-oregon-… - David Crumb: Red Desert
Bridge 9450
https://bridgerecords.com/products/9450 - Music of a Lifetime: Livingston Gearhart
Centaur CRC 3346
http://www.centaurrecords.com/store/albums/contemporary/music-of-a-life… - Douglas Detrick's AnyWhen Ensemble: Rivers Music (Origin Classical 33012)
- Douglas Detrick's AnyWhen Ensemble: The Bright and Rushing World
- Portland Opera/Anne Manson: Philip Glass, Galileo Galilei (Orange Mountain Music)
- Douglas Detrick's AnyWhen Ensemble: Walking Across (8bells records 017)
- Tomas Svoboda: Chamber Works- vol. I with clarinet (North Pacific Music LD 016)
- Trio 335: J.S. Bach- The Art of the Fugue (Equilibrium 48)
- New World Symphony/Michael Tilson Thomas: The Music of Ingolf Dahl (Argo 444 459-2)|
- Eastman Wind Ensemble/Donald Hunsberger: Live in Osaka (Sony Classical SK47198)
- American-Soviet Youth Orchestra/Leonard Slatkin: Dvorak, Symphony No. 9 "From the New World" RCA Victor/BMG Classics 09026-60594-2)
- American-Soviet Youth Orchestra/Catherine Comet and Leonid Nikolayev: Live from Bolshoi Hall and Finney Chapel (Imagine Records IBW 94901)
- Chorus Civitas Chamber Orchestra/Robert Taylor: Vaughan Williams, An Oxford Elegy (Centaur CRC 2299)
- Steve Vacchi, solo bassoon on An American in Istanbul: The Yeni Makam Series of Edward J. Hines (Edward Hines Music EHM 7799)
- Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra/Timothy Bergman: A Holiday Symphony (from BRSO)
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