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Kevin Zetina is a passionate performer, composer, and arranger of all things contemporary whether it be performing seminal works of the last century, premiering or writing brand new works, or arranging heavy metal music for contemporary classical ensembles. He has performed with members of Eighth Blackbird, Ensemble Signal, the JACK Quartet, and the Bang on a Can All-Stars. Kevin holds a BM from the Eastman School of Music with the Howard Hanson Scholarship where he studied with Michael Burritt, and he earned his MM and MMA degrees from Yale University as a Havemeyer Scholarship recipient under Robert van Sice.

As a performer, Kevin is a percussionist with multitudes of experience in contemporary music. Having grown up as a guitarist focused on various sorts of death metal, Kevin has always been drawn to music that is experimental in nature. ​In this effort to push experimentation in music Kevin started the first student-run new music ensemble at the Yale School of Music: Versicolor. The group champions composers who would otherwise be underrepresented and provides a space for contemporary music at Yale. Currently, Kevin is an active member of the Austin based contemporary chamber music group, Density 512

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As a composer, Kevin tries to blend his background in both contemporary western art music and popular music to create something that is both unique yet accessible to audiences from either background. His most recent projects include Coalescence (2021), a piece for mallet quartet & piano commissioned by the Yale Percussion Group, and shepard tone (2020), a piece for Vibraphone & Piano which was premiered at the Manhattan School of Music.

As an educator, Kevin works with students at all levels on instruments including drum-set, percussion, guitar, and piano. He has taught private percussion lessons for undergraduate students at Yale College and high school students at the Cheshire Academy, a private college preparatory boarding school in Connecticut. His students at Yale College, all of whom were non-music majors, have excelled comparably to conservatory students through winning spots at summer music festivals as well as the College Band Director's National Association's Intercollegiate Band. Prior to Yale, Kevin worked with high school students in Texas as a Marching Percussion Instructor as well as a private lesson teacher for guitar, drum-set, and percussion. Kevin is now based in Austin, Texas, where he teaches a private studio of about fifty young percussionists.

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As an orchestral musician, Kevin has worked in groups such as the Central Texas Philharmonic, New Haven Symphony Orchestra, the New Haven Chamber Orchestra, the Norwalk Symphony Orchestra, Yale Philharmonia, and the Greece and Irondequoit chamber orchestras in upstate New York. He has played under conductors including Peter Oundjian, Carolyn Kuan, Jean Mari-Zeitouni, Ludovic Morlot, Neil Varon, and Brad Lubman 

Education 

2020 - 2021

Yale University, MMA

2018 - 2020

Yale University, MM

2014 - 2018

Eastman School of Music, BM

Original works

2021

Coalescence, mallet quartet & piano

2020

shepard tone, piano & vibraphone duo

2020

Gleaming, multi-percussion solo

2019

Fleeting Lines, piano solo

2019

Sink, quartet for vibraphone, drumset, percussion, & piano 

2019

Shimmer, piano & percussion duo

2018

Floating Lines, vibraphone duo

2018

Catalyst, solo vibraphone and live electronics

2016

March, 6-channel fixed electronics

2015

Elastic Feels, multi-percussion solo

Teaching 

2019 - 2021

2019 - 2021

2014 - 2016

Yale College, Secondary Lesson Teacher

Cheshire Academy, Chair of Percussion Studies

Winston Churchill High School, Marching Percussion Instructor

Arranged works

2021

Blotted Science-Ingesting Blattaria, percussion sextet

2020

Meshuggah-Bleed, electric guitar & percussion sextet

2019

John Adams-Hallelujah Junction, mallet quartet

2018

Animal Collective-My Girls, piano & percussion trio

2018

The Contortionist-Language, piano & percussion trio

2017

Animal Collective-Alvin Row, piano, sop saxophone, & percussion quintet

2016

Meshuggah-Dancers to a Discordant System, percussion sextet

2016

Scale The Summit-Black Hills, percussion trio

2016

Adult Jazz-Dayhole, percussion quartet

2015

Antoine Dufour-These Moments, percussion trio

2021 - present

Walsh MS, Wiley MS, Pearson Ranch MS, Private Lesson Teacher

Inquire about private lessons, purchasing scores, or booking!

(210) 882-9906

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