Russ Lombardi

Professor Russ Lombardi performed on the fretless electric bass in various touring rock bands and resort jazz bands for several years before entering Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he graduated summa cum laude. Upon graduating, he taught music at the school for several years and later served as registrar of the college. He received his Master of Music degree in Jazz Studies with honors from Boston’s New England Conservatory studying composition and arranging with William Thomas McKinley and George Russell. Lombardi also taught music at Bowdoin College and The University of Maine at Farmington.

Lombardi’s compositions include a string quartet titled Glissening, which was recorded on the MMC label by the renowned Moyzes String Quartet in Bratislava, Czech Republic; two original chamber compositions premiered at New York’s Carnegie Hall; and two flute sextets premiered at the National Flute Association Convention in 1998 (performed again in 1999). Both sextets have subsequently been recorded by MMC. In March 2008, his electronic music composition Celestial Frost was also recorded and released by MMC. In summer 2008, Lombardi received a Trustee Professorship award to have his orchestral composition Tonisadie recorded by the Pilsen Symphony Orchestra in Pilsen, Czech Republic.

Lombardi had a variety of compositions and arrangements performed and published worldwide, including styles such as electronic music, big band jazz, small and large chamber ensemble, orchestral, solo piano, and concert band. He also arranged several classical solo piano pieces for Minstrel Press with global distribution and wrote a regular column titled Ideas for Improvisation for the International magazine Jazz Player.

In between his career as a musician, Lombardi developed and published a Maine county newspaper for 14 years titled The Somerset Gazette with his wife. He also contributed articles and stories for periodicals including The Bangor Daily News, The Kennebec Journal, The Maine Sportsman, The Maine Mountain Digest and The Maine Snowmobiler.

Lombardi taught Jazz Theory, Composition, and Arranging at UMA and played piano with his touring UMA student ensemble The UMA Café Jazz Ensemble. You can find recordings and reviews of his compositions released by MMC Recordings in various distributions worldwide, including Amazon.com, IODA (Independent Online Distribution Alliance), iTunes, Rhapsody, Live365.com, MP3.com, Napster, Classsical.com, MusicMatch, MSN Music, and more than 250 others.