By Steve Seepersaud
Each time Mike Holober, MM '83 (third from left in above photo) sits at his piano, he sees a reminder of his time at Binghamton University as a graduate student and teaching assistant then head of the jazz program. As a "thank you" gift for providing accompaniment to the master's recital for saxophonist Mike Carbone, MM '85, Holober received a metronome.
That's certainly not all Holober took from Binghamton. He came to the University trained in classical piano and left with a new musical direction.
"Al Hamme [founder of the jazz program in Harpur College] got me into the jazz scene," Holober says. "He said, 'You're in my band,' and that's how it got started. I already played jazz gigs on the saxophone and had begun writing so I knew the language."
Just like that, Holober was on the path toward becoming a professor, composer, arranger, pianist and Grammy® Award nominee. Since 1995, he has been teaching at the City College of New York, where he was recently named the inaugural Stuart Z. Katz Professor in the Humanities and the Arts.
"My style is definitely jazz, but because of my classical background, I like to think I have a broad harmonic palette," Holober says. "I didn't change from classical to jazz piano until I was 24, so I was a late bloomer, but I think that was an advantage when I started teaching.”
Holober is leader and pianist for The Gotham Jazz Orchestra, which earned a 2020 Grammy® nomination in the category of Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album. The accolade was for Hiding Out (ZOHO Music, 2019), a project that features two extended suites: “Hiding Out,” commissioned by (and premiered at) the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and composed at The Ucross Foundation of the Arts in Wyoming; and “Flow,” commissioned by the Westchester Jazz Orchestra and funded by a New York State Council of the Arts grant and composed at The MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire.
Holober does most of his writing for big bands. He's currently working on This Rock We're On, an extended work for jazz orchestra, cello, voice and percussion. Each song for the 20-player ensemble takes the form of an imaginary letter to or from a prominent person in the environmental movement.
He's also the leader of Balancing Act (pictured above), an eight-member group that gives him a breather from big band writing so he can explore a more intimate style. Last October, the group performed and recorded Don't Let Go at City College. It's a 14-movement, concert-length suite commissioned by a Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Grant. Holober says Don't Let Go explores the complexities of the concept of hope among today's social, political and environmental realities.
"I love that project because we have voice on it," Holober says. "I hired one of my students at City College to sing the vocal parts. Now I'm hiring my students, like Al Hamme did with me. It's great when you have talented students you want to work with."
As he teaches composition and writes music, Holober draws upon the concept of motivic development. Because genius can come out in the smallest ways, take something that works well and repeat it.
"When you [compose], you should make it logical and give a reason for the next thing you're going to write," Holober says. "I always say that if you don't know what to write next, flip backwards and look for something you already wrote and how it might show up in a different way."
With the support of endowments, Holober has had a number of residencies over the years allowing him to enjoy solitude and focus on his work. One of the most memorable locations was the MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire, which has a place in music history because it's where Aaron Copland wrote Appalachian Spring and Leonard Bernstein worked on his Mass.
"I've gone there six times now and I always feel a lot of pressure to write," Holober says. "One reason is that you're endowed and I feel so indebted to the people who [support me]. I feel the ghosts around me when I'm at the piano that Copland used, and I think, 'You better write something good!'"
Read more about Holober's background on his website.
