John Grimes, Timpanist
February 3, 1946 to August 8, 2013

JOHN E. GRIMES, ~ Musician-Teacher

John Grimes has enjoyed a distinguished career as a free-lance musician in the United States and abroad. He feels pride in the enormous variety of musical experiences and friendships that have intersected his paths. (To survive as a free-lancer one often has to wear many hats to help support one's first love. He believes that ultimately, pursuit of ancillary paths often helps produce a better artist.

A proud native of Key West, Florida, and true to his Cuban roots, Grimes took up percussion at the age of 10. In 1968, he graduated with a Bachelor of Music in Performance from the University of Miami. His first percussion teacher, mentor and lifelong friend, is Fred Wickstrom. Grimes played in the school orchestra and wind ensemble under Frederick Fennell, citing Fennell as a major influence in helping develop Grimes' keen ensemble performing skills.

Not long after arriving at the University of Miami, Grimes won a position with the Greater Miami Philharmonic. Upon graduation, he pursued the field of Theoretical Studies in Music at the University of California, San Diego, studying and performing New Music side by side with Robert Erickson, Roger Reynolds, Pauline Oliveros, Tom Nee, Yuji Takahashi, Nicolo Castiglione and Bert Turetzky. Within a week after arriving in La Jolla, Grimes became a regular performer with the San Diego Symphony.

In 1970, Grimes decided to interrupt his studies at UCSD and served for two years as principal timpanist of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Venezuela. While in Caracas, Grimes collaborated with Venezuela's foremost composer, Antonio Estevez, to establish a percussion curriculum at the Centro Simon Bolivar Electronic Music Studio.

Grimes moved to Boston in 1973 in order to focus on timpani. He studied with the Boston Symphony Orchestra's Vic Firth and received the Master of Music Degree with Honors in 1975 from New England Conservatory of Music. That summer he attended Tanglewood as a Leonard Bernstein Fellow.

A Fellow at the Blossom Festival during the 1973 and 74 seasons, he studied with Cleveland Orchestra timpanist, Cloyd Duff and performed chamber music under Josef Gingold and Robert Marcellus.

For most of his earlier career, Grimes performed the gamut of styles expected of a percussionist. From 1968-70, while at UCSD he performed and recorded new works of Harry Partch, Robert Hall Lewis, Robert Erickson, and Goffredo Petrassi. In 1980, he was a core member of Earl Kim's 'Ariel' New Music ensemble; In 1982, he toured with the Broadway Musical, "The Pirates of Penzance"; and in 1985, with the Philharmonia Hungarica.

In 1983, Grimes was invited to the Marlboro Music Festival to perform Bartok's "Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion" along with percussionist Neil Grover, and pianists Thomas Lorango and Bruno Canino. The performance was long regarded as one of the Festival highlights that year.

Grimes has performed with the Boston Symphony, Pops Esplanade Orchestra, and Harvard Chamber Orchestra. He has played for many conductors throughout his career, notably Seiji Ozawa, Mstislav Rostropovich, Leonard Bernstein, Leonard Slatkin, Sir Colin Davis, Bernard Haitink, Christopher Hogwood, Harry Christophers, Sir Roger Norrington, William Christie, Richard Egarr, Charles Dutoit, Michael Tilson Thomas, Gunther Schuller, Leon Kirchner, and Peter Maag.

As Principal Timpanist for Sarah Caldwell's Opera Co. of Boston for 15 seasons, Grimes performed many of Caldwell's cutting edge productions of both operatic standards as well as unique U.S. premieres.

Also during the 1980s, intrigued by Historically Informed Performance Practice, Grimes expanded his interests to the area of Baroque/Classical Period Instrument interpretation. For 30 years, he has consistently appeared with Boston Baroque, Cantata Singers, Handel & Haydn Society and performs regularly with Boston Ballet, Boston Lyric Opera and other organizations.

In past seasons, Grimes performed periodically at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood with the BSO, a highlight being the marathon concert in celebration of Leonard Bernstein's 70th Birthday.

Grimes appeared at the Edinburgh Festival (Handel & Haydn), the Athens Festival (Alea III), and the Krakow Beethoven Easter Festival (Boston Baroque).

In December 2001, he was elected Vice President of the Boston Musicians Association and re-elected in 2004 and 2007.

In August 2002, Grimes performed in Mozart's "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" with Concerto Köln at Amsterdam's Concertgebouw and the Luzern Festival under conductor David Stern.

In October 2005, he joined the percussion faculty at Boston Conservatory as timpani instructor.

In August 2009, he was invited to teach master classes and conduct the advanced percussion ensemble at El Sistema's Festival de Percusion de los Llanos in Guanare, Venezuela.

During the summer of 2010, he toured as timpanist with the Stars Wars in Concert Orchestra throughout the United States and Canada.

In November 2010, together with former student, William Shaltis, he co-presented a lecture on the History and Development of the Baroque Timpani at the Percussive Arts Society International Symposium in Indianapolis, IN.