Michael Zsoldos
saxophone, clarinet
Based in Woodstock, Vermont, woodwind specialist, educator, composer, conductor, Michael Zsoldos is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music and Michigan State University where he studied with Branford Marsalis. He has performed with Paquito D’Rivera, Sheila Jordan, Kevin Mahogony, Houston Person, Luis Perdomo, Jason Palmer, Matt Wilson, Bernadette Peters, Carole King, Ben Vereen, Bebe Winans, Yolanda Adams, and many others. Michael’s debut CD as a leader, Off the Cuff, is playing on streaming services and jazz radio stations worldwide. Currently, Michael is a member of the NYC-based Miro Sprague Quintet, the Jason Ennis Quartet, and Eugene Uman’s Convergence Project; a group whose original music merges Colombian rhythms with jazz harmonies. In addition to teaching and performing as a saxophonist, Michael plays and offers instruction on flute and clarinet. Since 2005, Michael has been the instrumental arranger for the Dartmouth College Gospel Choir and Dartmouth Idol. Michael composed the music for the 2017 documentary Seeing Through The Wall: Meeting Ourselves in Palestine and Israel. He was the orchestrator for the musical, 21, based on the life of baseball legend, Roberto Clemente, which had its premiere at Pointe Park University in Pittsburgh in October 2014. Michael is a lecturer in classical and jazz saxophone at Dartmouth, and for eight years was the jazz and classical saxophone instructor at the University of Vermont. He is on the teaching faculties of the Vermont Jazz Center in Brattleboro, and Interplay Jazz and Arts, based in the Upper Valley. He and his wife Elizabeth Reaves are the proud parents of Laszlo Zsoldos, now 2.