Benjamin C. Christy
Dean
(716) 878-6326
Campus Address: Rockwell Hall 222
christy@buffalostate.edu
Clarinetist Benjamin C. Christy is Professor of Music and Dean of the School of Arts and Humanities at Buffalo State College. A native of Dallas, he received his B.M.E. from Texas Christian University and his M.M. in Wind Instruments and A. Mus. D. in Clarinet Performance from The University of Michigan, where he was the Teaching Fellow in Clarinet and clarinetist and personnel manager of the Contemporary Directions Ensemble, a group which presented a concert series at the University under the auspices of the Rockefeller Foundation. At Rowan University in New Jersey, he served as professor of clarinet, Assistant to the Dean, Chair of the Department of Music, Associate Dean, and Acting Dean of the School of Fine and Performing Arts during a twenty-two year tenure at Rowan. Subsequently, he was Dean of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne for eleven years, where he was part of the team that generated more than $3 million in endowments for VPA and more than $26 million for a new music building that opened in fall 2007.
Dr. Christy has been featured as clarinet soloist in Vienna and the Soviet Union with the Leningrad State Chamber Orchestra and the Klassica Symphony Orchestra of Leningrad. He has also performed in Carnegie Hall and Town Hall in New York City, the Phillips Collection in Washington, D. C., and in Philadelphia's Academy of Music, as well as on television and radio and many college and community concert series. His New York Debut prompted Peter G. Davis to write in the New York Times, "The performances were polished to the letter, musically alert, admirably integrated and full of character...displayed more than sufficient expertise and tonal suavity to suggest that each could just as easily pursue solo careers."
As a freelance clarinetist, Dr. Christy has performed with many orchestral and chamber ensembles, including the Mostovy Concerto Soloists, The Performance Organization, Mozart on the Square, Hollybush Festival Orchestra, Young Audiences, the Delaware Symphony, the Bridgeton Symphony, and the South Jersey Symphony. He has received numerous awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, New Jersey State Council on the Arts, Paul Foundation, Mobil Oil Corporation, and national recognition as an Atlantic Richfield Regional Residency Chamber Ensemble during ten years as clarinetist and manager of the Kapelle Woodwind Trio. He has performed and presented workshops throughout the country, including the All-Eastern and All-New England MEA Conventions and the Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, North Carolina, Florida, Louisiana, Ohio, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Indiana and New Jersey MEA conventions, and at numerous band and orchestra concerts and festivals. He has performed as an artist/clinician for the G. Leblanc Corporation and The Selmer Company and has served as the New Jersey Coordinator of the International Clarinet Society and as a member of the boards of Ballet South (NJ), Fort Wayne Ballet (IN), Northeast Indiana Public Radio (IN) and the Foundation for Art and Music in Elementary Education (IN).