N. Scott Robinson

Music Department Adjunct

nscott.robinson@goucher.edu

http://www.nscottrobinson.com

Education

N. Scott Robinson received his BA degree in music and anthropology from Rutgers University, his MA degree in ethnomusicology from Kent State University, and is ABD for Ph.D. in Musicology-Ethnomusicology (with a minor in American History/Popular Culture Studies). Robinson's education includes a diverse background in performance, composition, and scholarship having with jazz drummers Joe Hunt, Skip Haden, Ed Uribe, Dave Weigert, and John Ramsey at Berklee College of Music in Boston and classical percussion with Gary Van Dyke and Ray DesRoches at William Paterson University where he performed with the New Jersey Percussion Ensemble. He studied jazz and classical music at Rutgers University where his teachers included composers Noel DaCosta, Phil Corner, Daniel Goode, jazz musicians Keith Copland, Kenny Baron, Bill Fielder, and percussionists William Moersch and Robert Benford. His principal teachers of ethnomusicology, musicology, and culture studies at Kent State University were Terry Miller, William Kenney, Robert West, and composer Halim El-Dabh. He has studied extensively with Glen Velez, Naná Vasconcelos, Malcolm Dalglish, Peter Erskine, Shona musicians Cosmas Magaya and Chaka Chawasarira, and Carnatic musicians T.V. Vasan, Amrit Nataraj, B. Shreesundarkumar, Erode K.S. Nagarajan, and Srirangam R. Kannan.

Areas of Scholarly Expertise and Interest

As a performer of many styles of percussion and world music, Robinson has appeared on the Grammy Award-winning CD Harlem Renaissance by Benny Carter. Wind & Fire by Mark Holland and N. Scott Robinson won a 2010 Indian Summer Music Award in Native American music.  He has 13 compositions published by HoneyRock Publishing, and he has recorded performances on 40 CDs and soundtrack DVDs having worked with jazz/world music artists Paul Winter Consort, Glen Velez, Larry Coryell, Jeanie Bryson, Art Baron, Howard Levy, Jamey Haddad, Michael Formanek, Simon Shaheen, Steve Gorn, U.K. Sivaraman, Native American artists Bill Miller, R. Carlos Nakai, Joseph FireCrow, Mary Youngblood, composers George Crumb, John Cage, Michael Colgrass, The Cleveland Orchestra, Marilyn Horne, popular and folk music artists Regina Belle, Gerald Alston, Peter Mayer, and Steáfán Hannigan. His performances have been featured at national and international music festivals and venues across the USA, in Canada, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Italy, Germany, and Greece at Carnegie Hall, Apollo Theater, Lincoln Center, The Knitting Factory, Severance Hall, Kennedy Center, Tamburi Mundi, Bang on a Can, Frame Drums Italia, Li Ucci Festival, Greek Frame Drums Meeting, Seoul Drum Festival, ArtScape, Lotus World Music Festival, and Kent State Folk Festival, among others.

Serving as Adjunct for the Music Department at Goucher College, Robinson teaches undergraduate music majors in Applied Music-World Percussion, directs the Percussion Ensemble, the general education course Introduction to World Music, and is a percussion staff member for the Goucher College Summer Arts Institute Drumset and Percussion Camp. He has also served on the faculty of Towson University, Montgomery College, The University of Akron, Kent State University, and Shenandoah University. Robinson was the recipient of a Senior Performing Arts Fellowship from the American Institute of Indian Studies at the University of Chicago.

Recent Publications/Presentations/Performances

As an ethnomusicologist, his published articles and ethnographic work appear in The Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World, Volume Two: Performance and Production, The Concise Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Volumes 1 & 2, World Music: A Global Journey, Dance in My Life, and he was a contributing editor/author on Hindustani music for the textbook Listen to This by musicologist Mark Evan Bonds. His reviews and ethnographic interviews are published in the journal Percussive Notes, Modern Drummer, Rhythm Music, Dulcimer Players News, and Batera & Percussão. He has presented papers, clinics, and workshops for the Society of Ethnomusicology, International Society for Improvised Music, North American Frame Drum Association, International Native American and World Flute Association, and Percussive Arts Society. Robinson has conducted fieldwork in India, Japan, South Korea, Italy, and the USA.