ITEAOnline Audio Library: Zach Collins

Chronicle

Biography

Zach Collins is Professor of Tuba and Euphonium at Indiana University of Pennsylvania.  At IUP Zach teaches applied lessons to all tuba and euphonium majors, leads the IUP Tubaphonium Ensemble and teaches classes in music history, theory, and music technology. Zach performs with the Hoodlebug Brass Quintet (IUP's faculty brass quintet), Eastern Standard, Keystone Wind Ensemble, Keystone Chamber Winds, and the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra. In 2015 Zach was awarded the  Distinguished Faculty Award for Creative Arts by Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

In 2014 he was named a National Arts Associate by Sigma Alpha Iota music fraternity.   

In addition to his position at IUP, Zach also maintains a busy solo and chamber schedule. He has performed as a soloist at the International Tuba and Euphonium Conference (2008, 2010, 2014), Northeast Regional Tuba Euphonium Conference (2011, 2013, 2015), U.S. Army Band Tuba-Euphonium Conference (2010), Western PASSHE Low Brass Consortium (2010), and Marshall University Tuba Day (2010).  Recent solo and chamber engagements have taken him to Ohio, West Virginia, Washington D.C., New York, Texas, and Moscow, Russia.  His interpretation of William Kraft's Encounters II for Solo Tuba was released on Cambria Master Recordings in August 2009.  

Zach has written a number of works for brass instruments. His compositions and arrangements for tuba and euphonium can be purchased from Cimarron Music. His arrangements of Joy to the World and Greensleeves for brass quintet can be published from Eighth Note Publications.

He is currently publishing a series of duets with scrolling music notation to YouTube. Bass Clef Duets are published every Friday and can be found on the Bass Clef Duets page.

Prior to his appointment at IUP, Zach had numerous freelance performing opportunities in Texas and California.  He has performed with ensembles such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Pacific Symphony, Festival Orchestra of the San Luis Obispo Mozart Festival, Riverside County Philharmonic, Santa Barbara Symphony, Monterey Symphony, Texas Chamber Orchestra, and the Texas Wind Symphony. In these ensembles Zach has performed under the baton of conductors such as Bramwell Tovey, Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Helmuth Rilling. In Los Angeles Zach performed on several motion pictures including Spider-Man 3, Pirates of the Carribean: At World’s End, X-Men 3, Bobby, Next, Rocky Balboa, and Live Free or Die Hard. In 2007 he performed with the band Korn on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno .

Zach Collins earned his Bachelor of Music in Tuba Performance from Texas Christian University (2003) and his Master of Music (2005) and Doctor of Music (2007) in Tuba Performance from the University of Southern California. While at TCU, Zach’s primary studies were with Richard Murrow, a freelance musician in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. At USC his teachers were Jim Self and Tommy Johnson, both studio musicians, and Norm Pearson, principal tubist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. 

To contact Zach Collins you can email him at zcollins@iup.edu.

Recording Program Notes

Chronicle features new and previously unrecorded works for solo tuba and tuba-euphonium ensemble by Douglas Briley, Christopher Wiggins, Anthony O'Toole, Jim Self, Bruce Yurko, and Zach Collins.

Tracks

Zachary Variations
Douglas Briley
Doug Briley is a talented pianist, composer, and is now CEO of a successful marketing agency in Texas. We attended the same church while I was in high school and he led the church orchestra. Doug offered to write me a piece, which I was able to premiere as an undergraduate student at Texas Christian University. Zachary Variations is a modern theme and variations, structured using the standard form. While the melody and harmony is quite tonal, it is not as predictable as brass players are accustomed to with Clarke and Arban. 

Published by Jabez Press

Soliloquy X
Christopher Wiggins
Christopher Wiggins and his "Soliloquy X" first came on my radar when the piece was  included on the repertoire list for the 2005 Leonard Falcone International Tuba Euphonium Festival. “Soliloquy X” is a superbly composed test piece for unaccompanied tuba that requires many of the same technical abilities of works like Penderecki’s “Capriccio” and Kraft’s “Encounters,” but with a more accessible form and tonality. "Soliloquy X" has stayed in my recital repertoire since that Falcone competition and has remained one of my favorite pieces to play, both for its effectiveness in performance, and for the challenges it poses to me.

Published by Studio Music

Chronicle
Anthony O'Toole
Anthony O’Toole is a 2011 graduate of Indiana University of Pennsylvania. As an undergraduate student, he already showed an unbelievable talent as a composer, creating a number of chamber ensembles as well as two tuba concertos and a euphonium concerto. Since that time he has continued to create an astounding catalog of works for every setting, small to large. Chronicle was composed for IUP alumnus, Jon Wylie. 

Published by Cimarron Music Press

Dozeanddeeze
Jim Self
Jim Self is best known as a studio musician in Los Angeles, performing on movie soundtracks for many of the leading film composers. He also holds positions with a number of orchestras in Southern California. To date, he has released 15 solo and chamber albums of his own. Dozeanddeeze is a one-movement work, originally written for solo trombone and piano. Jim Self reworked the composition for solo tuba in 2018. As with most of Jim Self’s compositions, the piece features humor, virtuosic passages, and moves between a variety of styles and grooves over the course of this short piece. 

Published by Jim Self Music (ASCAP)

Music for Solo Tuba
Bruce Yurko
Bruce Yurko has long been a friend of the music department at IUP, where I teach. In 2014 the IUP bands happened to be performing two of his band works on a concert that also included me performing a concerto by another composer. Following the concert Bruce generously offered to write a solo for me, resulting in this five movement composition for unaccompanied tuba. The five short movements in “Music for Solo Tuba” are distinct character pieces. There is a constant tension throughout the first movement, created by a slowly moving melody snaking through the lower register of the tuba. This snake-like melody is interrupted by a fanfare that grows in intensity until leading back to the original melody. Movement 2 has the feel of a tune one might whistle while walking down the street. The third movement is unsettled, with fitful, rapid interjections in a diminished tonality. The fourth movement is a sweet lament, followed by a rollicking final movement that joins elements of the jollity of the second movement with the intensity of the third.

Published by Cimarron Music Press

Scherzo for Piccolo Trumpet, Tuba and Piano
Valery Strukow
Scherzo was written for trumpeter Richard Stewart and tubist Skip Gray. Valery Strukow was a Russian composer who wrote a number of concerti, including a tuba concerto, as well as works for chamber ensembles and orchestras. I came upon this piece in 2014 when I had the honor or performing on a concert at the Moscow Conservatory given in memory of Alexey Lebedev. I heard two fantastic young Russian brass musicians perform the piece. Later that year I was happy to perform it for the first time myself with one of my closest friends, James McClarty, whom I grew up with in Texas and is now a member of “The President’s Own” U.S. Marine Band. Scherzo is a light trio that offers virtuosic and lyric passages for all three players.

Angle East
White Keys
Cinematic Fantasy
Zach Collins
I am thankful to the teachers that I have had over the years who have encouraged me to arrange and compose music. While I don’t consider myself a composer, I do think that developing the ability to arrange and compose has given me a skill that is invaluable in my position as a university professor. I can write music that is adapted to the specific ability levels of my students, challenges them where they are, and is hopefully fun to play. My first composition that met success is Cinematic Fantasy, a six-part ensemble composed for the IUP Tubaphonium Ensemble in 2009. My aim was to write a piece that seemed to tell a story by using the harmonies and devices found in movie soundtracks. In 2012 I composed an eight-part ensemble, Angle East, for my students. The title to this driving piece doesn’t actually mean anything. It was inspired by a conversation I had with the students who gave the first performance of the piece. The next time you see me or one of those students, ask us and we’d be happy to tell you the story. White Keys, a quartet composed in 2015, found its origin with the purchase of a piano for our home. I am a dreadful pianist, but I enjoy plunking out harmonic progressions. Because of my lack of piano playing ability, I am often limited to the white keys, on which the opening section of this piece can be played entirely.

All three compositions published by Cimarron Music Press

Where to find chronicle:

CD
CDBaby

Streaming
​​CDBaby
iTunes
YouTube
Amazon
Spotify
Google Play

Credits

​Piano : Amber Shay Nicholson
Trumpet: James McClarty
IUP Alumni Tubaphonium Ensemble: George Alberti, Logan Carnes, Christian Dickinson, Zack Grass, Mike Waddell, Abby Weaver, Anne Wertz; Conductor: Jason Worzbyt
Recording Engineer: Alan Teare
Mixing and Mastering: Jon Hansen
Producers: Heidi Lucas
James McClarty: Facilities: David Surtasky 

Recorded in Fisher Auditorium, Indiana University of Pennsylvania January 17-18, 20-21, February 17, 2019.

Recorded using the Miraphone Elektra F tuba.

Thanks

Thanks to my colleagues at IUP that helped make this project a reality:  Stephanie Caulder, David Ferguson, David Surtasky, Dan Alberts, and the IUP Sabbatical Committee. Thank you to Christian Niedermaier and the Miraphone Corporation for supporting me. Thank you to all of the composers featured on this album - you are the true artists. Most of all, thank you to my family, who put up with the endless hours of practicing day after day, year after year. ​

notes

​Ever since Doug Briley wrote “Zachary Variations” for me it had always been in the back of my mind to undertake recording a solo album. Over the years, I have had the good fortune of having friends, colleagues, and students who have written solos and chamber pieces for me to perform. However, the time and resources needed to complete a solo album have always seemed to be just out of reach. Thankfully, IUP awarded me a sabbatical for spring 2019, during which, with the help of many friends, I was able to complete this project. My hope is that this album brings a collection of solo works and a few chamber ensembles to the tuba-euphonium community that can find a place on recital programs.

Chronicle is dedicated to the teachers to whom I am indebted for their influence and example to me: Richard Murrow, Jim Self, Tommy Johnson, Norm Pearson, Doug Tornquist, and Gale Rask. 

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