the BRASS PROJECT
Members
Zachary Silberschlag
Zachary Silberschlag currently serves as principal trumpet of the Hawaii Symphony Orchestra. He has held principal trumpet positions with “The Orchestra Now” based in New York, The Chesapeake Orchestra, and the New York Festival Brass Quintet. He performs regularly at Carnegie Hall, New York’s Lincoln Center, and at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Recently, Zach performed in concert with Baltimore Symphony. Zachary has performed as a featured soloist with the Romanian State Symphony in Italy, Bulgarian Philharmonic, “The Orchestra Now,” Chesapeake Orchestra at River Concert Series and at National Harbor, and on numerous occasions in New York City. Zachary holds a BA from St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Masters of Music from Manhattan School of Music, and a Doctorate from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. In Spring 2018, Zachary with the New York Festival Brass played the premier recording of Elliott McKinley’s Brass Quintet. Zachary has attended the Eastern Music Festival and the National Orchestral Institute NOI.
Sam Nester
Australian born trumpet player Sam Nester leads a diverse career as a performer and educator. Nester has performed for Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival & Lincoln Center Out of Doors, the Beijing Modern Music Festival, BAM Next Wave Festival, the Paris Opera Ballet, Wordless Music Orchestra, Mark Morris Dance Group and the Festival of New Trumpet Music among others.
In 2019, Nester was the Bruny Island Foundation artist-in-residence, creating site-specific recordings inside the island’s iconic lighthouse. In 2020, he partners with George Mason University (USA), to design a yearlong interactive light and sound installation for their Virginia campus. In collaboration with visual artist Caroline Rannersberger, architect Christopher Clinton, and plant ecologist Daniel Sprod, Nester is designing a public art and sound installation, based on his Arcadia project, that will feature his solo performance as a trumpet player for the City of Hobart (Australia). Additionally, in July 2020, he is the US National Parks artist-in-residence for Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.
A passionate educator, Nester has taught and designed interactive education programs for a number of organizations and institutions in New York. He currently serves on trumpet faculty for The Juilliard School’s Music Advancement Program, a Saturday instruction program that actively seeks students from diverse backgrounds underrepresented in the classical music field. Additionally, Nester serves as the artistic director for Bridge Arts Ensemble, an arts education organization that partners ensembles of professional New York City based musicians with schools in upstate New York and in Charleston, South Carolina, serving more than 70,000 students annually.
The recipient of numerous awards, Nester has been a Fulbright Scholar, a recipient of the Australian Music Foundation Award, Brian Boak Outstanding Performer Award and an American Australian Association’s Dame Joan Sutherland Fund grantee. He graduated with a Bachelor of Music Studies from the Queensland Conservatorium and Bachelor of Music from the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (First Class Honors). He received a Master of Music and Doctorate of Musical Arts from the Manhattan School of Music, earning the Helen Cohn Award for outstanding performance. His primary trumpet teachers include David Elton and Mark Gould.
Cort Roberts
Hornist Cort Roberts joined the Brass Project in 2019, and enjoys bringing new brass music to life with the group. He lives in Brooklyn, and enjoys working in a variety of settings as a performer, educator, and entrepreneur. He performs frequently with The Orchestra of St. Lukes, Chamber Orchestra of New York, The Knights, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Fort Greene Orchestra, Contemporaneous Ensemble, and on several Broadway shows including The Lion King, Sunset Boulevard, and How to Dance in Ohio. In recent summers, Cort has been heard at Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts, and The Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival. In 2023, he served as the Interim Associate Principal/3rd Horn of the Auckland Philharmonia in New Zealand.
Cort is an alum of Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect, class of 2020-23. During his residency, he performed chamber music frequently in Carnegie Hall’s many venues, and around the Tri-State area. He also helped to develop and present a series of interactive concerts in NYC public schools, incarceration facilities, and organizations that support people with developmental disabilities.
A native of Colorado, Cort completed his undergraduate studies in 2017 at the University of Colorado Boulder. While there, he also finished minors in Business and Leadership Studies, and enjoys applying these skills in the entrepreneurial lifestyle of a freelance musician in New York City– always new projects to look forward to! Cort came to New York in 2017 to pursue his masters degree at The Juilliard School, which he completed in 2019. Shortly after, he began his Doctoral degree at Stony Brook University, and completed his studies in Fall of 2024.
Cort has always been passionate about spending quality time in nature and the outdoors– he enjoys hiking, backpacking, biking, running, rock climbing, skiing, and seeking beautiful views! You might spot him biking around the city between rehearsals and concerts with his horn on his back, preferring the fresh air and views to the subways!
Daniel Schwalbach
New York City-based tenor and bass trombonist Daniel Schwalbach enjoys a varied career of orchestral playing and chamber music and is frequently engaged throughout the country. An alumnus of the Curtis Institute of Music, Mr. Schwalbach studied under Nitzan Haroz and Matthew Vaughn on tenor trombone and Blair Bollinger on bass trombone. Other influential teachers include Samuel Schlosser of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra and Craig Knox of the Pittsburgh Symphony. Immediately following his studies at Curtis, Mr. Schwalbach joined the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra as Co-Principal Trombone for their 2016-2017 season. Mr. Schwalbach has performed with major ensembles across the united states including the New York City Ballet Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, Princeton Symphony, New World Symphony and Symphony in C.
An avid chamber musician, Mr. Schwalbach is a founding member of the Rendezvous Brass Quintet and The Brass Project. He has performed in esteemed concert halls and prestigious residencies with these ensembles, including the Aspen Music Festival (2015 Brass Quintet Fellowship Program, 2018 American Brass Quintet Seminar at Aspen) and Music From Angel Fire (2016), where he collaborated with Ida Kavafian, Gregory Zuber, and Peter Lloyd for a staged performance of Stravinsky’s L’Histoire du Soldat. The Brass Project’s entrepreneurial activities also include the recent release of their first album, Cityscaping, a collection of commissions that features works by Pulitzer and Rome Prize-winning composers.
Mr. Schwalbach was born and raised in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. He resides in Manhattan with his wife, Marié, a violinist in the New York Philharmonic.
Oliver Barrett
Oliver Barrett is a trombonist from Houston, Texas, who joined his middle school band program and never looked back. Oliver received his bachelor’s degree from the Manhattan School of Music and his master’s degree from The Juilliard School, both under the mentorship of Per Brevig. During his summers, Oliver has been heard as part of the Round Top Festival Institute, Aspen Music Festival, Colorado College Summer Music Festival, National Repertory Orchestra, Music from Angel Fire, and Bravo! Vail.
After completing his master’s degree, Oliver had the privilege of playing second trombone during the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra’s 2015–2016 season under the direction of Hannu Lintu, with additional performances as guest principal trombone of the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra. That same year, Oliver competed as a finalist for the International Trombone Association’s Lewis Van Haney Philharmonic Prize at the International Trombone Festival. In 2016 Oliver was selected to join Ensemble Connect at Carnegie Hall, which is "a two-year fellowship program for the finest young professional classical musicians in the United States." Recently, he performed as principal trombone of the American Symphony Orchestra and the Princeton Symphony.
As an educator, Oliver is currently a teaching artist with the New York Philharmonic and Interim Lecturer of Trombone at Princeton University. Recently, he presented masterclasses in both applied teaching and interdisciplinary collaboration at The Juilliard School. Oliver is pursuing his doctoral degree in trombone performance at the State University of New York at Stony Brook where he is the graduate teaching assistant.
Jake Fewx
Hailing from Sherwood, Oregon, Fewx holds degrees from the Yale School of Music and the University of Oregon.
Fewx's music career has brought him around the country to collaborate with renowned groups such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, Rhode Island Philharmonic, Eugene Symphony, and the Astoria Music Festival Orchestra in venues such as Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. For the 2015-16 season, Fewx held a one-year fellowship with the Orchestra Next ballet orchestra under the direction of Brian McWhorter. Fewx has performed with other notable groups such as the Mel Brown Jazz Orchestra, Yale Faculty Brass Trio, and the Patriot Concert Brass of New York City.
An accomplished soloist, Fewx has earned awards and high praise for his playing at the state-wide, regional, and international level. Most notably, Fewx was awarded first prize in the prestigious Leonard Falcone International Tuba Artist Solo Competition in 2018. In the spring of the same year, Fewx was selected as one of the winners of the Yale School of Music Woolsey Concerto Competition, the first tubist to ever receive the honor. In early 2019, Fewx was featured as a guest performer at the US Army Tuba Euphonium Workshop in Washington D.C.
In his free time, Fewx enjoys traveling, collecting vinyl records, gaming, and spending time outdoors. His major teachers include Carol Jantsch, Michael Grose, and JáTtik Clark.
