Vadim Karpinos was appointed to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 2001 by Maestro Daniel Barenboim. He was born in Kyiv, Ukraine, and began showing an interest in percussion at a very early age. He and his family moved to New York in 1991, and he attended the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Christopher Lamb, Duncan Patton, and Don Liuzzi.
Karpinos was a Tanglewood fellow and has performed with numerous orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, New Jersey Symphony, New York City Opera, Grant Park Symphony, and Rhode Island Philharmonic.
He has appeared as a soloist with numerous orchestras, including the CSO and at Roosevelt University, where he has been an adjunct faculty member since 2005. Karpinos is also on the board of advisors to The New Music School in Chicago, and he gives percussion clinics worldwide.
Karpinos has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Louis Smadbeck Scholarship, the Dr. Randolph Goodman Award, the Morton Gould Memorial Award, the ASCAP Leiber and Stoller Scholarship, first prize winner of the Soviet Union’s Young Virtuoso competition, and several other concerto competitions. He is an active chamber musician and has made many recordings with the CSO. Karpinos endorses Zildjian and Innovative Percussion.
In his spare time, he enjoys playing basketball, traveling, and spending time with his wife, Danielle, and their children, Anya Nessa and Aria Thea, in their home in River Forest.
