With innovative multi-genre original productions, sensational interpretations of modern works, and an “exhilarating blend of precision and anarchy, rigor and bedlam” (The New Yorker), Sō Percussion has redefined the scope and role of the modern percussion ensemble.

Sō’s repertoire ranges from classics of the 20th century (John Cage, Steve Reich, Iannis Xenakis) to commissions and new works by contemporary composers (David Lang, Julia Wolfe, Steven Mackey, Caroline Shaw) to distinctively modern collaborations with artists who work outside the classical concert hall (Shara Nova, choreographer Susan Marshall, Wilco’s Glenn Kotche, The National, Bryce Dessner). The members of Sō Percussion also compose and perform their own works (From Out a Darker Sea and Amid the Noise), employing a uniquely 21st-century synthesis of original music, artistic collaboration, theatrical production values, and visual art.

Season highlights include the Big Ears Festival; a Miller Theatre Composer Portrait event with composer-performer Caroline Shaw (with whom Sō has a new album due out later this season); performances of David Lang’s man made and Lully’s Le Bourgeois gentilhomme with Louis Langrée and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; and dates in Paris at the Cité de la Musique, in Klaipėdos, and across the US. In October 2019, Sō collaborated with choreographer John Heginbotham in a new ballet, RACECAR, which was performed in The Washington Ballet’s season-opening NEXTsteps production and featured the music of Jason Treuting. This season, Sō also celebrates its sixth year as Edward T. Cone Performers-in-Residence at Princeton University and the 12th year of the Sō Percussion Summer Institute (SōSI), an intensive two-week chamber music seminar for percussionists and composers. Sō also welcomes an album with indie pop duo Buke and Gase, and a New Amsterdam Records release of Songs That Are Hard to Sing, an octet by Dan Trueman written for and performed with the JACK Quartet (premiered by the two ensembles at Zankel Hall in March 2018).

Rooted in the belief that music is an effective tool in creating social bonds, agency, and citizenship, Sō Percussion enthusiastically pursues a growing range of social and community outreach. Examples include Sō’s Brooklyn Bound presentations of younger composers; commitments to purchasing offsets to compensate for carbon-heavy activities such as touring travel; and leading their SōSI students in an annual food-packing drive, yielding up to 35,000 meals for the Mercer County Family Crisis Center through the organization End Hunger NE.

Sō Percussion uses Vic Firth sticks, Zildjian cymbals, Remo drumheads, Estey organs, and Pearl/Adams instruments. Sō would like to thank these companies for their generous support and donations. For more information, visit sopercussion.com.