an Ding is a versatile percussionist who combines his training in Western classical music with a deep interest in new music, world music, and improvisation.



Biography:

Ian Ding was born and raised in Arlington Heights, Ill., outside of Chicago. He first studied music with his mother, a private piano teacher, and he played piano and cello before starting drum lessons in the fifth grade. At 14 he joined the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra as timpanist and percussionist. After initial college studies in pre-medicine, Ian Ding graduated with honors from the University of Illinois, studying percussion with Thomas Siwe and William Moersch. He then received a Master of Music degree from the Juilliard School, studying with Gregory Zuber of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. His other teachers include Daniel Druckman, Roland Kohloff, Jim Ross and Tom Stubbs.



In 2003, Ian Ding was appointed Assistant Principal Percussionist of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Prior to joining the DSO, he was a member of both the New World Symphony in Miami under Michael Tilson Thomas and the UBS Verbier Festival Orchestra in Switzerland under James Levine. With these and other orchestras, he has performed in concert halls throughout North and South America, Europe and Japan. In the fall of 2005, he will begin his appointment as Lecturer of Music at the University of Michigan.



Besides his orchestral work, Ian Ding is a dedicated performer of new, experimental and world music. He has appeared with the Arnold Schoenberg Choir, Bang On A Can @ MASS MoCA, the Festival of Ugly New Music, the Fountain Chamber Music Society of New York, the New Juilliard Ensemble, and the inter-disciplinary performance group Vision Into Art. He has performed chamber music with the composer-pianist Lukas Foss and has recorded electro-acoustic works by Herbert Brün under the composer's supervision. Ian Ding also performs regularly as a hand drummer and improviser with several Detroit-area music groups, and has studied South Indian and Middle Eastern hand drumming with Sriram Balasubramanian and Oussama Naja.