Cello Day at Butler University

Butler Faculty:

Dr. Max Geissler, Assistant Professor of Cello

Dr. Geissler is a passionate and communicative cellist with broad musical interests spanning multiple genres and disciplines. Dr. Geissler is joining Butler from his previous appointment as Assistant Professor of Cello at East Tennessee State University and is a member of the new music ensemble Latitude 49. Kalmia Garden Music Arts Foundation, a non-profit organization Dr. Geissler founded and directs in Durham, CT, just celebrated its 12th season. Dr. Geissler has been presented at a multitude of festivals. He has shared the stage with celebrated musicians such as Lynn Harrell, Mathieu Herzog, Clive Greensmith, Mihaela Martin, and Frans Helmerson. Through his work with Latitude 49, Geissler premiered works by dozens of composers.

As a dedicated teacher, Dr. Geissler teaches regularly at festivals such as ENCORE Chamber Music Institute’s Summer Academy and the Tennessee Cello Workshop and has been in residence to perform and teach at schools including Oberlin Conservatory, Princeton University, Vanderbilt University, and many more. Dr. Geissler’s students have been accepted into top-tier festivals and degree programs and have earned prestigious awards in national and international competitions.

In 2024, Dr. Geissler received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, serving as Desmond Hoebig’s teaching assistant. Previously, Dr. Geissler earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan under the mentorship of Richard Aaron.

Special Guest:

Dr. Wesley Baldwin, Professor of Cello, The University of Tennessee Knoxville

Cellist Wesley Baldwin holds degrees from Yale College, the New England Conservatory, and the University of Maryland. He performs throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia as a soloist and chamber musician. As a soloist with orchestra he has appeared with the Laredo Philharmonic, the Oregon Mozart Players, the Symphony of the Mountains, and the Aberdeen, Bemidji, Bryan, Chattanooga, Florence, Germantown, Johnson City, Hot Springs, Knoxville, La Porte, Oak Ridge, Manchester, New River Valley, Salisbury, Wintergreen, and Bismarck-Mandan Symphony Orchestras, among others. His passionate and charismatic performances have been widely lauded.

An advocate for great music from all eras, Mr. Baldwin is one of the only performers of several little known and new concerti for cello, including recently those by Sollima, Wagenseil, Jacob T.V., Behzad Ranjbaran, and Alan Shulman. His recording of music for cello by Alan Shulman, released by Albany records, enjoyed widespread critical acclaim. He has also recorded for the Naxos, Zyode, and Innova labels.

Wesley was the founder of the Plymouth String Quartet, with whom he was a top prize-winner in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. He was also cellist of the James Piano Quartet, with residencies at both Sweet Briar College and the Wintergreen Festival. More recently he has been a member of the Edison Piano Trio. Solo and chamber music performing honors Baldwin has received include the Homer Ulrich Award and the Tennessee Arts Commission Individual Performing Artist Fellowship, as well as recognition at the Prix Mercure, The Doug Davis Music Performance Awards, and the Paolo Borciani Quartet Competition.

As a member and principal cellist of the New World Symphony, Baldwin performed with many of the world’s great conductors and toured Japan, Scotland, England, Argentina, France, Monaco, and Brazil. His orchestral colleagues there selected him as the recipient of the New World Symphony’s Community Board Award for artistic integrity and leadership. For 15 years Wesley served on New World Symphony regional audition committee panels throughout the U.S.

Dr. Baldwin has performed chamber music at the Aspen, Cazenovia, Hot Springs, Ojai, Sandpoint, Mainly Mozart, May in Miami, Skaneateles, and Sub-tropics Music Festivals, and internationally in Italy, France, Monte Carlo, Spain, Austria, Brazil, Argentina, the United Kingdom, and Costa Rica. In 2017 and again in 2018 he had extended tours performing and teaching in China. In January of 2020 Wesley performed in a series of chamber concerts with the Ensemble D’Amici in South Korea.

In the summers Wesley performs and teaches at the Michigan City Chamber Music Festival, the ARIA International Academy, and the Ursus String Camp. For two decades he served as principal cellist of the Wintergreen Festival Orchestra. 

Dr. Baldwin serves as Professor of Cello at the Natalie L Haslam College of Music at the University of Tennessee, where he received the Chancellor’s Award for Professional Promise. Wesley previously taught at the University of Maryland and at Florida International University. His former students play and teach throughout the United States and Malaysia, and have gone on to study at Juilliard, the University of Michigan, and the Royal Academy of Music in London, among others.

Dr. Baldwin’s commitment to string education is significant. He founded and directs the Tennessee Cello Workshop, an annual three-day gathering of more than 150 cellists of all ages from throughout the United States held each February. After serving as conductor of the Knoxville Youth Chamber Orchestra for 15 years, he now serves as Director of the Knoxville Symphony Youth Orchestra Association Chamber Music program. In Knoxville he also serves as Co Director of the Knoxville Suzuki Academy.

 In recent years Dr. Baldwin has worked with several of his string colleagues at the University of Tennessee to create the Mosaic Music Anthologies, collections of solo and ensemble volumes of music for young string players made up of compositions by Black and Latino composers from all time periods. This project was supported by grants from both the Sphinx Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts. The first volumes are now available. Wesley lives in Knoxville with his wife, Soprano and Director Melisa Barrick Baldwin. They have four wonderful children.

• 9:30 AM Check-in, Lilly Hall east lobby
• 10:00 AM Technique/Warm-Up Class with Dr. Geissler
• 11:00 AM Cello Ensemble readings
• 12:00 PM Free lunch with current cello majors in campus dining hall, A-Town Cafe
• 1:30 PM Masterclass and Q&A with Dr. Wesley Baldwin
• 3:00 PM Instrument trials with Encore Orchestral Strings
• 4:00 PM Informal performance in Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall
• 4:30 PM Dismissal