Daniel Gordon
Professor of Music
Daniel Gordon is a Professor of Music at SUNY Plattsburgh, where he directs the Symphonic Band, teaches studio saxophone, and instructs various classroom courses. As a performer, he appears regularly both regionally and abroad. Regionally, he performs with Metamusic as well as with the Frontier Saxophone Quartet, which he founded with performers from the Plattsburgh region and Montréal. Abroad, Gordon has taught and performed in residency at the Suomen Työväen Musiikkiliitto International Summer Music Festival in Teisko, Finland since 2005 and was a part of the saxophone teaching corps at the Domaine Forget International Music Festival in northern Québec for summer residencies from 1997-99.
Equally active as a conductor, Gordon directs the Symphonic Band at SUNY Plattsburgh, has served as director of the McGill University Wind Symphony and the Adirondack Youth Orchestra, and is founder, president, and director of the Adirondack Wind Ensemble (AWE), a professional group consisting primarily of music educators from around the North Country. AWE performs annual winter concerts in E. Giltz Auditorium and at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts under his directorship.
Gordon’s other performing credits include appearances at Alice Tully Hall and Bruno Walter Auditorium at New York’s Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts; the American Embassy in Paris; the Circle of Fine Arts in Madrid; Kuhmo Chamber Music Hall, Tampere-Talo, Mikkeli’s Martti Talvela Hall, and the Turku Concert House in Finland; Pollack and Redpath Halls in Montréal, and several smaller venues in Canada, Finland, France, Italy, Spain, and the U.S.
Writing occupies an important part of Gordon’s activity. His articles on various aspects of conducting and the saxophone, as well as on non-musical topics as diverse as food, travel, and puzzles, have been published in over a dozen periodicals. He has also authored a full-length book entitled Sax on the Streets: Confessions of an American Street Musician in Europe, which chronicles his (mis)adventures performing saxophone duets with a friend across thirteen European countries in the late 1980s. Published by SynergEbooks, it is available online at http://synergebooks.com/ebook_saxonthestreets.html or on CD-ROM from the author.