Lewis Lipnick
Bassoon
yspbear@aol.com
Bachelor of Music, 1968, The Peabody Conservatory of The Johns Hopkins University
Professor Lewis Lipnick was born in the District and grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland. He played clarinet as a child and remembers when his junior high band director brought in a bassoon and asked if anyone wanted to try it. "I have always loved a challenge, so I said I'd try it, and I've played it ever since." He went on to study at Peabody with a minor in cello. His bassoon teachers were Ken Pasmanick of the National Symphony Orchestra, Gerald Corey, and Sol Schoenbach, "the greatest of them all--he's really the father of the American bassoon school."
Prof. Lipnick felt whenever he heard the contrabassoon played that it was not played very well, so he started studying it on his own, again enjoying the challenge. He was hired as second bassoon of the National Symphony Orchestra in 1970. When a contrabassoon opening occurred in the NSO, Truman Harris was hired to fill it. Prof. Lipnick one day asked Truman whether he liked playing contra, and the two found out that they really would prefer to trade positions. With former Music Director Antal Dorati's approval, that's exactly what the two men did. Prof. Lipnick subsequently noticed that Gunther Schuller had written a challenging contrabassoon part in his Concerto for Orchestra, so he approached the composer about a concerto for his instrument. Mr. Schuller was happy to oblige, the NSO commissioned the work, and Prof. Lipnick performed the first-ever concerto for contrabassoon, not only in Washington, but in New York with the American Composers Orchestra and in Munich with the Bavarian Radio Orchestra.
Prof. Lipnick's wife, Lynn-Jane Foreman, is a professional actress. The two share an interest in English antiques. He also has a business (Your Silent Partner) designing sophisticated audio/video systems. He writes regularly for Stereophile magazine and Audio/Video Interiors.
