About Andrew Bambridge

Andrew Bambridge is a percussionist, composer, and actor from New Jersey.  He has written for soloists and ensembles across the country and has performed at the Kennedy Center, the NJPAC, and Lincoln Center.  In 2020, Andrew Bambridge was named a “Rising Artist” by All Arts, a web channel operated by WNET, for his accomplishments as a marimbist and his work combining percussion and theatre.

Andrew is a first-year graduate student pursuing a Master of Music at Mason Gross School of the Arts (MGSA), part of Rutgers University.  His concentration is in performance, studying percussion with Joseph Tompkins, Mike Truesdell, Javier Diaz, and Ian Sullivan.  He received his Bachelor of Music in May of last year from MGSA where he studied composition with Robert Aldridge in addition to studying percussion.  He is a graduate of The Juilliard School’s Pre-College Division and is a winner of VSA’s 30th Annual International Young Soloist Competition.

As the artistic director of Center for Musical Excellence, I am always on the look out for new and undiscovered talents.  They come to me, sometimes, by my colleagues’ recommendations and other times through young artists’ own research about our organization.  Tyson Davis and Andrew Bambridge are currently on our roster of CME Young Artists, whom we mentor.  Patricio Molina is a CME alumnus. Theo Chandler, Ji-Young Ko, and Daniel Newman-Lessler applied for our Grant program, and I got to know their work through that process. I decide on young artists when I notice a deep passion and drive within them, plus a certain kind of sparkle in the personality and lots of humility.  In addition to musical talents, I believe these are the qualities that will take the young artists far.  CME’s motto is "Moving Musicians Forward".  I’ve chosen our Discovery Composers based on these qualities,  whom we felt we could easily move forward.

- Min Kwon

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