Bassoonist
Bassoonist • Educator • Activist • Scholar
Midori Samson is a member of the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra and the Beloit-Janesville Symphony. She is a former Fellow of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, a training program of the Chicago Symphony. Her position involved frequent engagements as a teaching artist and orchestral, chamber, and solo performer across Illinois; all in a typical week, her schedule could involve playing in an orchestral rehearsal at Symphony Center, solo recital at a nursing home, chamber music concert in an art museum, and teaching artist residency at a juvenile detention facility. She also previously performed as a bassoonist and contrabassoonist in the Chicago, Omaha, Madison, Charleston, Austin, South Dakota, and New World symphony orchestras, in addition to Japan’s Pacific Music Festival, the New York String Orchestra, and the National Orchestral Institute. As a chamber musician and soloist, she has performed at the Banff Centre, Norfolk and Bowdoin International music festivals, Caroga Arts Collective, and composer Elliott Carter’s 102nd birthday party. She was a winner of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Concerto Competition and was the inaugural winner of the Wind Ensemble Concerto Competition. Most notably, she has commissioned and premiered twelve solos by composers from across Africa. She continues to champion these works through frequent recital performances—including appearances at the Ubumuntu Art Festival’s “100 Stories of Home” (Rwanda), Music by Women Festival at Mississippi University for Women, and Meg Quigley Symposium—and through a grassroots sheet music distribution program.
