Lawrence Gwozdz

Lawrence Gwozdz studied with Sigurd Rascher and Jean-Marie Londeix and has advocated the instrument design developed by Adolphe Sax. Born in Niagara Falls, New York, to Polish-American parents, he trained earlier with Ronald Tyree, Robert Fought and Laurence Wyman, took degrees at SUNY Fredonia, the University of Nebraska and the University of Iowa, and made an annotated translation of Jaap Kool's Das Saxophon. Samuel Adler, Walter Hartley, Zdeněk Lukáš, Armand Russell, Robert Starer, Roger Vogel and John Worley have dedicated works to him. As Professor of Saxophone at the University of Southern Mississippi — he later became emeritus there — he built a studio that drew players from abroad, and he made his New York debut at Weill Recital Hall. An American Tribute to Sigurd Rascher is among his Crystal Records discs; in August 1999 he recorded the Glazunov and Erland von Koch concertos with the Plovdiv Philharmonic under Nayden Todorov. Gwozdz appeared as a saxophone soloist at the Thracia Summer Music Festival in Plovdiv in 1999.