"His perfect knowledge of music and instrument can
only be equaled by the delicacy and elegance of his playing."
Alain Marion
Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique
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New York
flutist Don Bailey has recorded for Summit,
Genuin, Parnassus, and Albany Records. In its review of his debut CD
Voyage,
American Record Guide praised his “impeccably controlled sound...
full of artful colors and nuances…exceptional attention to
detail…unfailing precision”. Fanfare said his
Tribute CD was
“...a delight from beginning to end... Bailey boasts a brilliant
technique and a bristling sense of excitement.”.
A native of Clarksdale, Mississippi, Don
began his career in Dallas, Texas. He is a former university
professor, board member of both the Greater Dallas Youth Orchestra and
the New York Flute Club, and past president of the Texas Flute Society
and the Louisiana Flute Society. He has performed at festivals in Aspen,
Colorado, and Spoleto, Italy, among others, and at several National
Flute Association conventions.
He is director and
flutist of
Voyage Unlimited, Inc., a New York not-for-profit
organization committed to the performance, recording, and publication of
new and standard chamber music for flute. As solo flutist with Classical Quintessence aboard the Cunard cruise ship Vistafjord, he
performed with Polish pianist/composer Adam Manijak, who has
become an integral part of the Voyage Unlimited mission. The Voyage
Unlimited Series of new orchestrations by Don and Adam is published
by
Falls House Press
and distributed by Theodore Presser.
During the summer of
2005, Don worked closely with composer
Gian Carlo
Menottiat his
home in Scotland, compiling a chronology of the composer’s
works, and later at the
Festival of Two Worldsin Spoleto, Italy organizing and performing on the
chamber music concerts. In February 2007, he collaborated with members of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and Dallas
Opera Orchestra in a recording of Menotti’s
The
Old Maid and the Thief,
produced by
Lone Spring Artsand released December
1, 2007 by Albany Records.
Don's articles have been
published in national music journals including
Flute Talk magazine and Flute Forum. He was interviewed
by Windplayer Magazine
for its best-seller
Flute Stories -
101 Inspirational Stories by the World's Best Flute
Players, which has become a must-read for anyone
in the performing arts. He was also interviewed for the Fall 2007 issue of
The Flutist Quarterly,
The Musical Road Less Traveled by Helen Spielman, and he is the cover interview of the
September 2008 issue of
Flute Talk.
Don studied flute at the doctoral level at the University
of North Texas, and summers at the Aspen Music
Festival, and the Académie d'été in Nice, France. His teachers include
the distinguished flutists
Julius Baker,
Michel Debost,
Alain Marion,
Judith Mendenhall,
George Morey, Marcel Moyse,
and Albert Tipton.
