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Susan Fancher, soprano saxophone, Robert Faub, alto saxophone,
Steven Stusek, tenor saxophone, Mark Engebretson, baritone saxophone
The Red Clay Saxophone Quartet was formed in 2003 in North Carolina when the fates conspired to bring four internationally recognized saxophonists
together in Greensboro. The RCSQ takes its name from the area's luscious red soil. The Quartet's
repertoire features music by composers as varied as Ben Johnston, Burton Beerman, Mark Engebretson, Lenny Pickett, Alejandro
Rutty, Ben Boone, Steve Reich and Gavin Bryars.
Susan Fancher's work to develop the repertoire
for the saxophone have produced dozens of commissioned works by contemporary composers, as well as published transcriptions
of music by composers as diverse as Josquin Desprez, Ben Johnston and Steve Reich. She has worked with a multitude of
composers in the creation and interpretation of new music including Terry Riley, Michael Torke and Charles Wuorinen, just
to name a few, and has performed in many of the world's leading concert venues and contemporary music festivals. Her
extensive discography includes a solo CD entitled Ponder Nothing on the Innova label and a recording on New
World Records of Forever Escher by Paul Chihara. Susan Fancher is a regularly featured columnist for the nationally
distributed Saxophone Journal. Her principal teachers were Frederick Hemke, Jean-Marie Londeix, Michael Grammatico
and Joe Daley. She is a clinician for the Selmer and Vandoren companies, and teaches saxophone at Duke University.
Robert Faub is an accomplished classical soloist,
chamber musician and jazz artist. He was formerly the alto saxophonist with the widely acclaimed New Century Saxophone
Quartet, with whom he performed extensively throughout the United States and in the Netherlands. He appears on New Century's
recordings A New Century Christmas and Standards.
As a soloist, he gave the first performance of Ben Boone's concerto Squeeze with
the University of South Carolina Symphony, adding to a long list of works he has premiered. His recording of Andrew
Simpson's Exhortation, included on Arizona University Recording's America's Millenial Tribute to Adolphe Sax, was "immaculately played," according to The Double Bassist magazine.
Robert is the Director of Bands at Caldwell Academy in Greensboro, NC. He also shepherds an accomplished studio of young private
students, plays extensively with local jazz combos and appears regularly with the North Carolina, Greensboro and Winston-Salem
Symphonies.
Steven Stusek is Assistant Professor of Saxophone at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
He performs frequently with Dutch accordion player Otine van Erp in the duo 2Track, was director of Big Band Utrecht and is
a founding member of the Bozza Mansion Project, an Amsterdam-based new music ensemble. The list of composers who have
written music for him include Academy Award winner John Addison. His many awards include a Medaille d'Or in Saxophone
Performance from the Conservatoire de la Région de Paris, winner of the Saxohone Concerto competition at Indiana University,
Semi-finalist in the Concert Artists Guild Competition, Vermont Council on the Arts prize for Artistic Excellence, and Finalist
in the Nederlands Impressariaat Concours for ensembles. His teachers include Daniel Deffayet, Jean-Yves Formeau, Eugene
Rousseau, David Baker, Joseph Wytko and Larry Teal.
Mark Engebretson is Assistant Professor of Composition and Electronic Music at the University of North
Carolina at Greensboro. A former resident of Vienna and Stockholm, he has received numerous commissions from the Austrian
Ministry of Culture, STIM (Sweden) and the American Composers Forum Commissioning Program. His Duo Concertante
was recently premiered by the Wroclaw (Poland) Philharmonic. Mark Engebretson has appeared twice as a concerto soloist
with the Brno (Czech) Philharmonic Orchestra. He is well represented as a composer and performer on the Innova label
and has performed with Klangforum Wien, Swedish percussionist Anders Åstrand and the Intergalactic Contemporary Music Ensemble.
His principle teachers were Michel Fuste-Lambezat, Frederick Hemke, Jean-Marie Londeix, M. William Karlins, Pauline Oliveros,
Marta Ptaszynska, Michael Pisaro, Stephen Syverud and Jay Alan Yim.
Concert Programs
Tikvah
A multi-media oratorio by Burton Beerman for soprano voice, chorus, saxophone quartet, video and dance, based on
memoirs of Torah scholar and Holocaust survivor Philip Markowicz.
The Composers of the Carolinas
The Carolinas boast a bevy of first-rate composers! This program features a selection from the many who have
written music for saxophone quartet, including Ben Johnston, Russell Peck and Ron Parks.
Sax Appeal
An upbeat and energetic evening of jazz- and popular music-inspired works by composers such as Ben Boone, Lenny Pickett
and Robert Carl.
French Connections
A concert of music with various connections to France, including works by Francis Poulenc, Jean Baptiste
Singelée and Gavin Bryars.
Never Too Tango!
The Lorena Guillén Tango Trio (Argentinian soprano Lorena Guillén, pianist Alejandro Rutty and bandoneonist David Alsina)
joins the Red Clay Saxophone Quartet for a delicious evening of tangos.
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