Fernando Meza is Associate Professor of Music and Director of Percussion Studies at the University of Minnesota School of Music (Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.A). He has also held teaching positionas at The Ohio State University (Columbus, Ohio, U.S.A), the Universidad de Costa Rica (San Jose, Costa Rica), and the Instituto Nacional de Musica (San Jose, Costa Rica).
Fernando started his musical studies at age 9 in the Youth Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica and later moved to the U.S.A. to study at Carnegie-Mellon University (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) Baylor University (Waco, Texas), and University of Michigan (Ann, Arbor, Michigan). His teachers include Stuart Marrs, John Soroka, Larry Vanlandingham, and Michael Udow.
Fernando has had a wide variety of interests and musical experiences throughout his career, including orchestral, chamber-music, contemporary, folk, world-music, experimental, solo, and musical theatre. He served as Principal Percussionist/Assistant Timpanist of the Costa Rica National Symphony Orchestra from 1989-1991 and can currently be heard performing or touring with the Minnesota Orchestra or the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra two of the groups with whom he performs regularly.
He has performed with marimba virtuoso Keiko Abe in Japan, the U.S.A. and Costa Rica and recorded "Conversation in the Forest" for her album "Marimba Spiritual: Keiko Abe and the World's Leading Percussionists". He also performs regularly with the "Jovan Perkussion Projekt" along with marimbist/percussionist/composer Nebojsa Zivkovic and has recorded his "Trio per Uno" for the CD "The Castle of the Mad King", and "Lamento e Danza Barbara" for the CD "Composer's Portrait" two of Zivkovic's highly successful CDs.
He was one of the original percussionists for the world-premiere of the Broadway show of "The Lion King" and can be heard on the original-cast CD recording of the show on the Sony label. He has also recorded for the Equilibrium, Denon-Columbia, BIS, Redwood Records, Reference, and D'Note labels.
As a great enthusiast of contemporary chamber music emanating from Latin America, he also performs with the percussion quintet GRUPO CLAVE along with fellow musicians Orlando Cotto, Rolando Morales-Matos, Bismarck Fernandez, and Carlomagno Araya.
He has recently finished recording "Chorado" by Brazilian guitarist Guinga, in his own arrangement for marimba and flugelhorn with Chuck Lazarus, principal trumpet of the Canadian Brass, and has also recorded 3 of the 6 Cello Suites by J.S. Bach. This CD should be available by the end of 2005.
Fernando started his musical studies at age 9 in the Youth Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica and later moved to the U.S.A. to study at Carnegie-Mellon University (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) Baylor University (Waco, Texas), and University of Michigan (Ann, Arbor, Michigan). His teachers include Stuart Marrs, John Soroka, Larry Vanlandingham, and Michael Udow.
Fernando has had a wide variety of interests and musical experiences throughout his career, including orchestral, chamber-music, contemporary, folk, world-music, experimental, solo, and musical theatre. He served as Principal Percussionist/Assistant Timpanist of the Costa Rica National Symphony Orchestra from 1989-1991 and can currently be heard performing or touring with the Minnesota Orchestra or the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra two of the groups with whom he performs regularly.
He has performed with marimba virtuoso Keiko Abe in Japan, the U.S.A. and Costa Rica and recorded "Conversation in the Forest" for her album "Marimba Spiritual: Keiko Abe and the World's Leading Percussionists". He also performs regularly with the "Jovan Perkussion Projekt" along with marimbist/percussionist/composer Nebojsa Zivkovic and has recorded his "Trio per Uno" for the CD "The Castle of the Mad King", and "Lamento e Danza Barbara" for the CD "Composer's Portrait" two of Zivkovic's highly successful CDs.
He was one of the original percussionists for the world-premiere of the Broadway show of "The Lion King" and can be heard on the original-cast CD recording of the show on the Sony label. He has also recorded for the Equilibrium, Denon-Columbia, BIS, Redwood Records, Reference, and D'Note labels.
As a great enthusiast of contemporary chamber music emanating from Latin America, he also performs with the percussion quintet GRUPO CLAVE along with fellow musicians Orlando Cotto, Rolando Morales-Matos, Bismarck Fernandez, and Carlomagno Araya.
He has recently finished recording "Chorado" by Brazilian guitarist Guinga, in his own arrangement for marimba and flugelhorn with Chuck Lazarus, principal trumpet of the Canadian Brass, and has also recorded 3 of the 6 Cello Suites by J.S. Bach. This CD should be available by the end of 2005.