PEOPLE
leonard bopp, conductor/artistic director
Leonard Bopp is a conductor, trumpet player, curator, and concert producer based in New York City. Fiercely committed to the music of our time, Leonard is the Founder and Artistic Director of the BlackBox Ensemble, a New York-based contemporary music ensemble devoted to producing culturally-resonant projects rooted in creative experimentation. Under his leadership, BlackBox has performed multiple world premieres by emerging composers, given performances at major museums, universities, and concert venues in NYC and beyond, and was selected for Chamber Music America’s 2022 Ensemble Forward program, through which they were coached and mentored by Alan Pierson of Alarm Will Sound. Recent projects include a site-specific dance performance at the Clark Art Institute, and the staged premiere of Borrowed Landscape, a play by the German playwright duo tauchgold with original music by Dai Fujikura, as part of a program at the Noguchi Museum. Upcoming projects include a reprise performance of Borrowed Landscape as part of a two-concert series at the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art and a collaboration with the CNSNC composers collective. He is also producing the ensemble’s inaugural BlackBox Fest, a weekend-long performance series at ShapeShifter Lab and Roulette in January 2024.
Leonard recently studied at the 2023 Tanglewood Music Center Conducting Seminar and the Jorma Panula Masterclass with the MAV Symphony Orchestra in Budapest, Hungary. He also attended the Divertimento Ensemble Conducting Masterclass in Moncalvo, Italy, where he was selected to conduct the final concert of the masterclass at the Fabbrica del Vapore in Milan. He will return to the Divertimento Ensemble as a guest conductor on their Milan concert series in February 2024. In the summer of 2022, Leonard was a recipient of the American Austrian Foundation/Faber Young Conductors Fellowship, through which he was in residence at the Salzburg Festival observing rehearsals and of the Vienna Philharmonic. Leonard studied trumpet at The Juilliard School Pre-College Division, earned his BA in Music and English at Williams College, and completed his Masters of Music in Orchestral Conducting at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance.
annie nikunen,
flute/marketing director
Annie Nikunen is an NYC-based composer, flutist, dancer, choreographer, sound artist and radio broadcaster, whose work ranges from concert music and field recordings to dance and film. Her work explores connections between composition and choreography, always considering the physicality of sound in relation to movement and space. Her works have been featured nationally and internationally, performed by ensembles and performers including ZOFO, International Contemporary Ensemble, Fonema Consort, Apply Triangle, Jamie Clark, Camilla Caldwell and more. Annie is also the youngest member of Periapsis Music and Dance. Nikunen is a DJ at WKCR, where she also served as Business Manager and Director of the Classical Department, and coordinated WKCR’s 40th-annual Bachfest. Nikunen holds a BA in Music (composition/theory) from Barnard College, Columbia University, where she also studied flute performance in the Manhattan School of Music dual program with Tara O’Connor. She studied composition with Georg Friedrich Haas, Ellie Hisama, Seth Cluett and Mahir Cetiz, and was actively involved with Columbia’s Computer Music Center. She was the recipient of the Charles S. Miller Award as well as the Boris & Eda Rappoport Prize, both for distinction in music composition, from Columbia’s Music Department. She recently earned her MM in Composition at New York University, where she studies with Julia Wolfe, Michael Gordon, and Joan LaBarbara, and was selected as a 2023 composition fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center.
tyler neidermayer, clarinet/technical director
Tyler Neidermayer is an NY-based electroacoustic composer/performer who is pushing the boundaries of the clarinet and bass clarinet to new extremes. Dedicated to consistently presenting new works for clarinets and live electronics, he frequently collaborates with emerging composers to explore the extremes of his instruments and realize new musical ideas. Tyler likes to explore live sound processing and manipulation within his compositions, allowing space to create and control in performance. Tyler is a member of Apply Triangle, an NYC-based electroacoustic trio. He also runs sound and records shows for multiple ensemble and solo artists in NYC, as well as editing audio for various podcasts. He recently released his self-produced EP This Isn’t You. Tyler earned undergraduate degree from Northern Arizona University and his masters degree in Contemporary Clarinet Performance from the Manhattan School of Music’s Contemporary Performance Program.
TEAGAN FARAN, VIOLIN
A native of Buffalo, NY, Teagan Faran is a multidisciplinary musician focused on enacting social change through the arts. Faran has collaborated with the International Contemporary Ensemble, Alarm Will Sound, Palaver Strings, and the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra. Recent recording features include albums with Carlos Simon, La Martino Orquesta Típica, and loadbang. She has had compositions featured at the NYSSMA Conference and the Persis Vehar Competition for Excellence. Also active in the world of tango music, she has performed with Victor Lavallén and the Orquesta Escuela de Emilio Balcarce, as well as at festivals across the United States.
As a soloist, Faran has performed with the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Greater Buffalo Youth Orchestra (including a performance in Salsomaggiore Terme, Italy), the Ann Arbor Camerata, the Williamsville East Symphonic Orchestra, and the University of Vermont Symphony. Administratively, she worked as the AAC’s executive director for a season, and held internship positions in the Marketing and Education Departments of the Buffalo Philharmonic, and Education and Concerts/Touring with Jazz at Lincoln Center. She founded Ann Arbor arts collective Red Shoe Company and is a teaching artist with the Kennedy Center, the University Musical Society and the Sphinx Organization.
After graduating from the University of Michigan, Faran moved to Buenos Aires on a Fulbright grant. Faran was also a Turn The Spotlight Fellow, receiving their inaugural Hedwig Holbrook Prize. Faran participated in OneBeat, a fellowship in musical diplomacy, DeeDee Bridgewater’s Woodshed Network, and recently graduated from the Manhattan School of Music, where she studied Contemporary Performance. Faran teaches at DePauw University and the Sa’Oaxaca International Strings Festival as well as being a certified personal trainer, with a focus on career longevity for performers.
DUDLEY RAINE, IV, VIOLA
Dudley Raine, IV is a freelance violist currently based in New York City. His most recent musical endeavors include performing in Phantom of the Opera on Broadway, American Ballet Theatre at the Met, and with the American Symphony Orchestra. In addition to BlackBox Ensemble, he has also performed with Contemporaneous, Infrasound, and Semiosis Quartet in New York City, and Kassia in Washington DC, among others. Some other notable appearances this season included a performance with composer & singer Nia Imani Franklin (Miss America 2019), and premiering “The Sparks Fly Upward” by Cathy Lesser Mansfield as principal violist in Cleveland. Dudley is artistic director of the Seven Hills Chamber Music Festival in his hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia, and is currently organizing a tour with pianist & SHCMF programming director Nicole Brancato for the festival musicians in a future season. Dudley earned his Bachelors and Masters in Viola Performance from Manhattan School of Music, studying with Karen Ritscher and Shmuel Katz. Outside of the arts, Dudley is a distance running hobbyist, who completed the 2017, 2018, and 2021 New York City Marathons. The viola Dudley plays was made by Carlo Carletti in 1910.
jordan bartow, cello/director of ENGAGEMENT
Jordan Bartow is a NYC-based cellist from South Carolina dedicated to the promotion, development, and performance of new works. In addition to his work with the BlackBox Ensemble, Mr. Bartow is also an experienced teacher of cello, being certified in Suzuki teaching under Tanya Carey in Chicago, and is experienced in teaching students of all ages a joy for exploration, improvisation, and music both contemporary and classical. Jordan earned BM in Cello Performance from the University of South Carolina and his MM from the Contemporary Performance Program at the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Fred Sherry. Jordan is currently pursuing his DMA at the University of South Carolina a fellow in the New Sounds Quartet, UofSC’s premiere graduate student quartet focusing on contemporary classical music.
j CLANCY, percussion/DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS
jc is an NJ/NYC-based experimental musician, improviser, A/V engineer, and abolitionist activist/organizer. Originally trained in piano, drumset, classical percussion, and Balinese gamelan, they now thrive in the queered outer edges of instrumental, vocal, electroacoustic, and theatrical performance. In collaboration with experimental guitarist and activist Corey Mahaney, they are building towards the grassroots creation of an all-inclusive and safe community space in NYC, intended to sustain and uplift radical, queer approaches to artmaking and community organizing. In professional spheres, jc is the core percussionist of Blackbox Ensemble, and has had the privilege of performing with numerous established ensembles, including Hong Kong New Music, Da Capo Chamber Players, the United Nations Chamber Society, Contemporaneous, Man Forever, Nief-Norf, So Percussion, Tilted Axes, and InfraSound. Additionally, jc’s international experimental duo with Australian vocalist Amber Evans, panSonus, is a recent co-recipient (in collaboration with composer Max Vinetz) of Harvard University’s 2020 Fromm Foundation Commission grant. In the near future, jc will be featured as the drummer on a forthcoming full-length record from NJ hardcore band Dumpweed.
YIFEI Xu, piano
Pianist Yifei Xu has been described as an “incredibly passionate and logical pianist” and “an amazing demonstration of prodigious skills.” She has participated and performed in the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival New Music Workshop as a fellow, Aspen Music Festival, Bang on a Can, Mostly Modern Festival, Almalfi Coast Piano Festival, and Merkin Concert Hall. Winner of MMF Concerto Competition, Vivo International Music Competition, she has also received the Roy M. Rubinstein Award, the first prize in The American Prize Professional Solo, and was honored by the Eisenberg/Fired Concerto Competition. A recent career highlight includes performing the Rautavaara Piano Concerto No.1 with American Modern Orchestra under the baton of Austin Symphony Orchestra Music Director Peter Bay at Saratoga Springs in June 2022. Xu specializes in contemporary piano performance and currently performs with the BlackBox Ensemble. She earned her Bachelor and Master of Music degrees at Manhattan School of Music, and is completing her Doctoral of Musical Arts degree at MSM, studying with Dr. Marc Silverman.