Hailed by the Guardian as “a cellist of power and grace” who possesses “mature artistry and willingness to go to the brink,” cellist Seth Parker Woods has established a reputation as a versatile artist straddling several genres. In addition to solo performances, he has appeared with the Ictus Ensemble, Ensemble L’Arsenale, Zone Experimental, Basel Sinfonietta, Ensemble LPR, Orchestra of St. Luke’s and the Atlanta and Seattle symphonies.
An advocate for contemporary arts, Woods has collaborated and worked with a wide range of artists ranging from Louis Andriessen, Elliott Carter, Heinz Holliger, G.F. Haas, Helmut Lachenmann, Klaus Lang and Peter Eötvos to Peter Gabriel, Sting, Lou Reed, Dame Shirley Bassey and Rachael Yamagata to visual artists such as Ron Athey, Vanessa Beecroft, Jack Early, Adam Pendleton and Aldo Tambellini.
In the 2020-21 concert season, Woods will make debuts at EMPAC, the Strathmore, Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Spoleto Festival. This season also will include premiere performances of concertos by Tyshawn Sorey with the Seattle and Atlanta symphonies (David Robertson and Maxim Emelyanychev, conductors) and the late Fausto Romitelli with John Kennedy and the Spoleto Festival Orchestra. Woods will serve as the new 2020-21 artist-in-residence for the Kaufman Music Center in New York City, as well as guest artist at the Juilliard School, University of Iowa, University of Vancouver, Stanford University, Boston Conservatory, Ammerman Center for Arts and Technology at Connecticut College and Northwestern University Center for New Music.
In recent years, Woods has appeared in concert at the Royal Albert Hall/BBC Proms, Snape Maltings Festival, the Ghent Festival, Musée d’art Moderne et Contemporain, Le Poisson Rouge and the Bohemian National Hall, Cafe OTO, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Klang Festival-Durham, INTER/actions Symposium, ICMC-SMS Conference, NIME-London, Sound and Body Festival, Instalakcje Festival, Virginia Tech, La Salle College and FINDARS, among others. Recent awards include an artist grant from Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, Earle Brown/Morton Feldman Foundation Grant, McGill University-CIRMMT/IDMIL visiting researcher residency, Centre Intermondes Artist Residency, Francis Chagrin Award, Concours [Re]connaissance-Premiere Prix and the Paul Sacher Stiftung Research Scholarship.
His debut solo album, “asinglewordisnotenough” (Confront Recordings-London), has garnered great acclaim since its release in November 2016 and has been profiled in the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, the Guardian, 5against4, I Care If You Listen, Musical America, Seattle Times and Strings Magazine, among others.
In the 2021-22 season, Woods joins the faculty at the University at Buffalo as a distinguished visiting scholar and visiting professor. He previously served on the music faculties of the University of Chicago, Dartmouth College and the Chicago Academy of the Arts. He holds degrees from Brooklyn College, Musik Academie der Stadt Basel and a doctorate from the University of Huddersfield.
In the 2020-21 season he was an artisti-in-residence with the Kaufman Music Center, and from 2018-2020 he served as artist-in-residence with Seattle Symphony and creative consultant for the interactive concert hall, Octave 9: Raisbeck Music Center.
Woods is a Pirastro Artist and endorses Pirastro Perpetual Strings worldwide.
