Ed  Gazouleas

Violist and Teacher Ed Gazouleas was appointed Professor of Viola at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University in 2012. He has emerged as one of the finest teachers of his generation and his students now populate the viola sections of many orchestras, including the Boston Symphony, St Louis Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony and many more in this country and in Europe, Asia and South America.

He previously taught at Boston University College of Fine Arts where he maintained a teaching studio and at Boston Conservatory.

Gazouleas had a long career in the Boston Symphony and he led the viola section there on many occasions, notably with conductors Kurt Masur, Andre Previn, James Levine and Colin Davis. He has pursued an active career as chamber musician and recitalist as well. He has played with members of many string quartets, among them Pacifica, Fine Arts, Muir, Lydian and Audubon. He was a prize winner in the Eighth International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France, and has collaborated with many other artists including Christian Tetzlaff, Stephanie Blythe, Roberto Diaz, the Boston Symphony Chamber Players and the principal string players of the Cleveland Orchestra.

As a recitalist, Gazouleas appears often with pianist Pei-Shan Lee. Recent venues include Tsai Performance Center at Boston University, Auer Hall at Indiana University, Goethe House Boston where the duo performed the complete works of Hindemith and Brahms for viola and piano, and Williams College. Gazouleas is interested in the expansion and promotion of new works for the viola and in 2019 performed the North American premiere of “Letters from Warsaw” by Joseph Phibbs.

Ed Gazouleas’s wide range of interests in music and education led him to co-design the curriculum and teach New England Conservatory’s pathbreaking course in Entrepreneurship for Musicians. He also taught Orchestral Repertoire for Violists at NEC and is in demand as an orchestra clinician around the country. Recent teaching engagements have taken him to New World Symphony in Miami and National Orchestral Institute at University of Maryland. Gazouleas has given other recent master classes at Cleveland Institute of Music and the Curtis Institute. In September of 2019 he travels to Mexico City for a recital and series of master classes at UNAM.

In the Boston Symphony Gazouleas served as Chairman of the orchestra’s Artistic Advisory Committee and was elected to the orchestra’s Music Director Search Committee which chose Andris Nelsons as the orchestra’s music director. He has maintained a connection with the Boston Symphony through his annual work for Tanglewood Music Center where he was named in 2019 as Head of Orchestra Activities.

Gazouleas attended the Curtis Institute and studied viola there with Michael Tree and Karen Tuttle. In 2017 he was appointed as Visiting Viola Faculty at Curtis and travels to Philadelphia four times a semester. The heart of his teaching life remains at the Jacobs School where his approach might be summarized as helping students achieve a musical voice through a detailed and physically comfortable, efficient technique. The “how” is as important as the “why” for many students, from beginners to the most accomplished.