About Me
Matthew Szemela is a violinist who enjoys performing in a variety of genres. In the classical realm, Matthew has performed as soloist, chamber and orchestral musician in several renowned concert halls in NYC (Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully, Merkin Recital Hall) and abroad (Belgium, Luxembourg). Branching away from the classical stage, he has performed with Grammy Award winning jazz vocalist Cassandra Wilson, the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company, guitarist Vernon Reid of Living Colour, Susan Sarandon, Olivia Newton John, Josh Groban and Def Jam recording artist Rihanna, as well as portraying an Irish rock violinist in the Warner Brothers film August Rush, due for release in 2007. In the summer of 2006, Matthew served as concertmaster of the Hustla Symphony Orchestra for Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt 10th Anniversary Concert at Radio City Music Hall (NYC), collaborating with ?uestlove and the Illadelphonics, Beyonce, Foxxy Brown, Pain in Da Ass, Memphis Bleek and Sauce Money. This past fall he had the pleasure of collaborating with Savion Glover for select performances of “Classical Savion.†Matthew is a member of the fusion band DBR & THE MISSION (ICM Artists), with whom he will be touring extensively this spring. He also performs regularly with Vince Giordano and The Nighthawk’s, a big band devoted to performing hot jazz of the ‘20s and ‘30s, and is a founding member of the oboe-violin-keyboard trio known as Initial Ascent, a group that performs original composed repertoire, and also takes elements of classical, jazz and progressive rock and infuses them with free and modal improvisation...This profile was edited with Thomas' myspace editor™ V2.5
