Matt Glaser is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 and bluegrass

Bluegrass music

Bluegrass music is a form of American roots music, and a sub-genre of country music. It has mixed roots in Scottish, English, Welsh and Irish traditional music...

 violinist. He served as the chair of the string department at the Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music

Berklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...

 for more than twenty-five years. He is now the founder and artistic director of Berklee's American Roots Music Program.

He holds an M.M. degree from Tufts University

Tufts University

Tufts University is a private research university located in Medford/Somerville, near Boston, Massachusetts. It is organized into ten schools, including two undergraduate programs and eight graduate divisions, on four campuses in Massachusetts and on the eastern border of France...

. He has performed at Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....

 with Stephane Grappelli

Stéphane Grappelli

Stéphane Grappelli was a French jazz violinist who founded the Quintette du Hot Club de France with guitarist Django Reinhardt in 1934. It was one of the first all-string jazz bands....

 and Yo-Yo Ma

Yo-Yo Ma

Yo-Yo Ma is an American cellist, virtuoso, and orchestral composer. He has received multiple Grammy Awards, the National Medal of Arts in 2001 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011...

, and at the Boston Globe Jazz Festival with Gunther Schuller

Gunther Schuller

Gunther Schuller is an American composer, conductor, horn player, author, historian, and jazz musician.- Biography and works :...

. He has also performed with Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

, Ralph Stanley

Ralph Stanley

Ralph Stanley , also known as Dr. Ralph Stanley, is an American bluegrass artist, known for his distinctive singing and banjo playing.-Biography:...

, Lee Konitz

Lee Konitz

Lee Konitz is an American jazz composer and alto saxophonist born in Chicago, Illinois.Generally considered one of the driving forces of Cool Jazz, Konitz has also performed successfully in bebop and avant-garde settings...

, David Grisman

David Grisman

David Grisman is an American bluegrass/newgrass mandolinist and composer of acoustic music. In the early 1990s, he started the Acoustic Disc record label in an effort to preserve and spread acoustic or instrumental music.-Biography:Grisman grew up in Hackensack, New Jersey...

, Mark O'Connor

Mark O'Connor

Mark O'Connor is an American bluegrass, jazz, country and classical violinist fiddler, composer and music teacher. O'Connor's music is wide-ranging, critically acclaimed, and he has received numerous awards for both his playing and his composition...

, Andy Statman

Andy Statman

Andy Statman is a noted Klezmer clarinetist and bluegrass/newgrass mandolinist.Andy Statman was born in Brooklyn, New York City. He first gained acclaim as a mandolinist in pioneering bluegrass bands Country Cookin' and Breakfast Special. Statman, who grew up in a traditional but secular Jewish...

, Jamey Haddad

Jamey Haddad

Jamey George Haddad is an American percussionist working primarily in the fields of jazz and world music, and specializing in hand drums.-Biography:...

, Jay Ungar

Jay Ungar

Jay Ungar is an American folk musician and composer. -Biography:Ungar was born in the Bronx , the son of immigrant Jewish parents from Eastern Europe. He frequented Greenwich Village music venues during his formative period in the 1960s...

, Bruce Molsky

Bruce Molsky

Bruce C. Molsky is an American fiddler, banjo player, guitarist, and singer. He primarily performs old-time music of the Appalachian region.Molsky was born in 1955 at New York Infirmary in Manhattan, and grew up in The Bronx...

, Darol Anger

Darol Anger

-Career:Darol Anger entered popular music at the age of 21 as a founding member of The David Grisman Quintet. Anger played fiddle to David Grisman's mandolin in The David Grisman Quintet's 1977 debut. He co-founded the Turtle Island String Quartet with David Balakrishnan in 1985 and performed,...

, Art Baron

Art Baron

Art Baron is an American jazz trombonist. He also plays didgeridoo, conch shell, penny-whistle, alto and bass recorder, and tuba.Baron is an alumnus of the Berklee College of Music...

, and the International String Quartet Congress.

He is featured on the Grammy Award

Grammy Award

A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

–winning soundtrack for Ken Burns

Ken Burns

Kenneth Lauren "Ken" Burns is an American director and producer of documentary films, known for his style of using archival footage and photographs...

's 1990 The Civil War

The Civil War (documentary)

The Civil War is a documentary film created by Ken Burns about the American Civil War. It was first broadcast on PBS on five consecutive nights from Sunday, September 23 to Thursday, September 27, 1990. Forty million viewers watched it during its initial broadcast, making it the most-watched...

 documentary and the soundtrack for the 1978 film King of the Gypsies

King of the Gypsies

The title King of the Gypsies has been claimed or given over the centuries to many different people. It is both culturally and geographically specific. It may be inherited, acquired by acclamation or action, or simply claimed. The extent of the power associated with the title varied; it might be...

. He served on the board of advisors for Ken Burns's 2001 Jazz

Jazz (documentary)

Jazz was a 2000 documentary miniseries, directed by Ken Burns. Jazz was the last in a trilogy by Burns, following The Civil War and Baseball...

 documentary and appears as a narrator in the film.

In addition to founding his own musical group, called the Wayfaring Strangers ( featuring Tony Trischka

Tony Trischka

Tony Trischka is an American five-string banjo player.-Biography:Tony Trischka was born in Syracuse, New York, and graduated from Syracuse University with a B.A in Fine Arts, and was inspired to play the banjo in 1963, listening to the Kingston Trio's "Charlie and The MTA". Trischka was a...

, Laszlo Gardony

Laszlo Gardony

Laszlo Gardony is an American jazz pianist / composer born in Hungary who has released nine albums and leads his own trio.-Biography:Gardony studied at the Béla Bartók Conservatory in Budapest, graduating in 1979....

, Tracy Bonham

Tracy Bonham

Tracy Bonham is an American alternative rock musician best known for her 1996 single "Mother Mother".Raised in Eugene, Oregon, Bonham is a classically-trained violinist and pianist...

), he has been a member of the Central Park Sheiks

Central Park Sheiks

The Central Park Sheiks were a folk band that formed in the early 1970s. They released several albums on major labels, and many well-known musicians were associated with or in the band, such as Matt Glaser,Richard Lieberson, and Bert Lee. The band was also associated with Samuel R Delany's...

, the New York Bluegrass All-Stars, and Fiddle Fever. He has recorded an album with fellow fiddle player Kenny Kosek

Kenny Kosek

Kenny Kosek, born in 1949 in The Bronx, New York, is an American fiddler who plays bluegrass, country, klezmer, folk music and roots music. In addition to his solo career, he has performed with many other well-known performers and contributed to film and television soundtrack music. He is also a...

 and has appeared as a guest on numerous other recordings.

He has authored two books: Jazz Violin and Jazz Chord Studies for Violin, and an instructional video, Swingin' Jazz Violin.

Glaser lives in Somerville, Massachusetts

Somerville, Massachusetts

Somerville is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, located just north of Boston. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 75,754 and was the most densely populated municipality in New England. It is also the 17th most densely populated incorporated place in...

. His notable students include Casey Driessen

Casey Driessen

Casey Christopher Driessen is an American bluegrass fiddler and singer. He plays acoustic and electric five-string violins, each of which has an additional low C string....

.

Select discography

With Skitch Henderson

Skitch Henderson

Lyle Russell Cedric “Skitch” Henderson was a pianist, conductor, and composer. His nickname reportedly derived from his ability to quickly "re-sketch" a song in a different key.- Biography :...

• Swinging With Strings (Arbors Records
  Arbors Records
  Arbors Records is an independent American jazz record label based in Clearwater, Florida. It was founded by the family team of Mat and Rachel Domber in 1989, initially devoted to the recordings of their friend Rick Fay.-History:...
  
  )

External links

• Matt Glaser faculty page from Berklee College of Music site
• Berklee Profile of Matt Glaser
• Interview with Matt Glaser