Profile: Edward Higgins

Edward Higgins, D.M.A.
Associate Professor of Music
Director of Bands

Office: XSB 215
Phone: 503.725.3051
Fax: 503.725.8215
E-mail: Ehiggins@pdx.edu

Education: B.M. The Juilliard School; B.F.A. California Institute of the Arts; M.M. The Juilliard School; D.M.A. University of Missouri Kansas City; Primary conducting studies; Gary W. Hill and Robert Halseth; Coaching includes- Frederick Fennell, H. Robert Reynolds, and Allan MacMurray.

Profile: Dr. Edward Higgins is currently serving as Associate Professor of Conducting/Wind Studies and Director of Bands at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon. His duties include conducting the Wind Symphony, Concert Band, and teaching graduate and undergraduate conducting. He also serves as Artistic Director and Conductor of the Pacific Crest Wind Symphony, and is the founder and co-clinician of the Oregon Conductor's Symposium at Portland State University. Previous music faculty experience includes brass pedagogy and conducting positions at University of California at Davis, California State University/Sacramento, Washburn University, and the public schools of Sacramento and Stockton, California.

Dr. Higgins' instrumental career began with two seasons as a trumpeter with the Spoleto Festival Orchestra (Spoleto Italy) during which time he appeared as the Orchestra's Principal Trumpet on a Grammy-award winning recording of Samuel Barber's Anthony and Cleopatra. He went on to become the principal trumpet of the Sacramento Symphony. Higgins now performs exclusively on the tuba and currently serves as principal tubist with the La Crosse (Wisconsin) Symphony.

As a guest conductor, clinician, adjudicator, and music educator, he has made appearances throughout the United States. While co-directing at Washburn University in Topeka Kansas, Higgins appeared on three occasions at the Kansas Music Educator's Conference and one performance at the College Band Director's Association Mid-west regional conference. Dr. Higgins' most recent extra curricular conducting activities have included appearances with the Portland Summer Festival Orchestra, the High School for the Performing Arts of New York (The "Fame" school) the Lawrence Chamber Orchestra, and the La Crosse (WI) Symphony Orchestra Winds. His performance with the Lawrence Chamber Orchestra received critical acclaim and as a result, aired on N.P.R.

His edition of Robert Russell Bennett's Suite of Old American Dances is published by Hal Leonard Publishing, and currently serves as the model for a new line of re-issued master works.