Roland Rizzo
Roland performing on his Aurea Clarinets
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Rolands Bio
Roland is an honors graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music and was elected to Pi Kappa Lambda (the National Music Honor Society); his graduate studies are from Catholic University’s Benjamin T. Rome School of Music. Roland's clarinet instructors/mentors include: David Hersh (Public School), Felix Viscuglia (Boston Symphony), Joe Allard (NBC Symphony under Toscanini), William Thomas Ridenour (Clarinet designer for Leblanc and RCP), Carl Herman (New Jersey Symphony), Steve Barta (Baltimore Symphony) and Ken Lagace (Hartford Symphony).
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Mr. Rizzo has performed with the Wellesley Orchestra, Meriden Symphony Orchestra, New Britain Symphony Orchestra, Goodspeed Opera House Orchestra, Hunt Valley Symphony Orchestra and the Baltimore Philharmonia Orchestra. He has been a featured soloist with the Meriden Symphony Orchestra, Hunt Valley Symphony Orchestra (Weber Concerto No. 1), Baltimore Philharmonia (Mozart Concerto) and at his Alma mater, the New England Conservatory of Music (Bernstein Prelude Fugue and Riffs).
Mr. Rizzo has been a public school as well as private music teacher. He currently is a Sound Designer/Composer for Firaxis games where he is the Project Audio Director for the Civilization product line and has been the Audio Lead for the X-COM product line.
Roland on Lyrique AureA Clarinets
The AureA clarinets are rich and very even playing horns - both within registers and when jumping back and forth between registers. They play in tune throughout the range of the instrument and always with focus, no spreading. And they're not bad to look at! Although while you're playing that's for others to judge.
You will notice no wood clarinet bashing, since I do own and use my wood clarinets, also. But in this time of Covid, many venues/rehearsal spaces require doors to be open to the outside for circulation - even in early and late winter. In these cases, I take my reeds and my AureAs and head out in confidence that the horns are going to sound great, play great and not be bothered by the sometimes extreme temperature changes - and obviously no worries about cracks.