2007 Guest

We are proud to bring to Hattiesburg the renowned
composer and double bassist Frank Proto

Frank Proto
Biography

Frank Proto, born in Brooklyn, New York, began piano studies at the age of 7 and the double bass at 16. As a student of David Walter at the Manhattan School of Music, Frank performed the first solo double bass recital in the history of the school. As a composer he is self-taught.

During the early 1960s Frank worked as a free-lance bassist in New York City, performing with the Symphony of the Air, American Symphony, the Robert Shaw Chorale, Princeton Chamber Orchestra, various Broadway and Off-Broadway show bands and in many of the jazz clubs that were a mainstay of New York nightlife at the time.

In 1966 he joined the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra for a 30 year stay in which the orchestra premiered over 20 large works and countless smaller pieces composed for Young People's concerts, Pop's concerts, tours and special occasions.

During his tenure every music director commissioned him to compose works to feature various principal players or the orchestra itself on its subscription concerts, recordings and tours - including Max Rudolf, Thomas Schippers, Walter Suskind, Michael Gielen and Jesus Lopes-Cobos.

He has written music for such artists as Dave Brubeck, Eddie Daniels, Duke Ellington, Cleo Laine, Benjamin Luxon, Sherill Milnes, Gerry Mulligan, Roberta Peters, François Rabbath, Ruggerio Ricci, Doc Severinsen, Richard Stoltzman and Lucero Tena. Almost every major, metropolitan and regional orchestra in the U.S. as well as orchestras in all parts of Asia and Europe have performed his compositions.

In 1977 he began a collaboration with double bass virtuoso François Rabbath. He has written Rabbath five major compositions with orchestra that span a musical landscape from the most contemporary and serious - Four Scenes after Picasso - to the wildly popular Carmen Fantasy. Rabbath, whose musical appetite is as wide-ranging as Proto's has recorded all of the pieces and continues to perform them worldwide.

In 1993 Proto began another collaboration, with poet, playwright and author John Chenault. Working with Chenault has brought an added dimension to Proto's music - the visual. Their pieces bring a more all-encompassing, quasi-theatrical experience to audiences.

Working in such an all-encompassing musical atmosphere, both as a player and a composer, has resulted in Proto being able to become as comfortable with the large orchestra as he is with a jazz rhythm section.

Proto is passionate in his belief that performing artists and composers should not hesitate to tackle the pressing issues that confront contemporary society- the controversial social and political issues that most artists are loathe to confront with their art. Examples of his work in this area include the chamber works; Afro-American Fragments, Mingus - Live in the Underworld, Four Rogues - a Mystery for Double Bass and Piano and The Games of October for Oboe and Double Bass. Orchestral works include; Can this be Man?, Ghost in Machine and My Name is Citizen Soldier, The Profanation of Hubert J. Fort.