Brent Phillips

Brent Phillips is Associate Professor of Trombone at Baylor University. Prior to his position at Baylor, Mr. Phillips was assistant principal trombone of “The President’s Own” US Marine Band in Washington DC and is currently principal trombone of the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra in Pennsylvania, the Waco Symphony Orchestra and the Abilene Philharmonic. Mr. Phillips has soloed with the “President’s Own” on thirty separate occasions and has been a featured soloist with the Harrisburg Symphony on five occasions. Most recently, Mr. Phillips was a semi-finalist for the assistant principal trombone position with the New York Philharmonic.

As trombonist with the “President’s Own”, Mr. Phillips has gained extensive experience as a soloist. In the fall of 2000, Mr. Phillips was a featured soloist on the Marine Band’s fifty-two day national concert tour and has soloed numerous times with the Band at Wolf Trap Farm Park and the National Mall. Mr. Phillips recently gave the world premiere of “Tarkus” for trombone and orchestra with the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra in May of 2007 and was an invited soloist at the Eastern Trombone Workshop performing Tarkus with the US Army Band in 2008. The work received rave reviews and was featured in a recent New York Times article on trombone soloists and commissions. Mr. Phillips premiered “Tarkus” in Brussels and Ostend Belgium and will be releasing a recording with the Baylor Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Stephen Heyde.

Mr. Phillips performs regularly with the Dallas Symphony and has recent performances with the Houston Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic and the Houston Grand Opera and Ballet. Additionally he as performed with the San Antonio Symphony, Richmond Symphony, Delaware Symphony, Maryland Symphony, Alexandria Symphony, Annapolis Symphony, Fairfax Symphony, Washington Symphonic Brass and the National Symphony.

The recent release of “Myths and Legends” and “Diversions” by Stentorian Consort contains exclusive first recordings by Fisher Tull, Eric Ewazen, Charles Wourinen, Leslie Bassett, Jacques Casterede and others. Mr. Phillips collaborated with Joseph Alessi and Peter Ellefson on “Diversions” which premiere’s new works by Anthony Barfield and Eric Ewazen. Both of the Stentorian Consort recordings have been released under the Albany Records label and have received stellar reviews.

In addition, he has also recorded with the New Colombian Wind Band and the Dominion Brass. Mr. Phillips can be heard playing all of the trombone tracks on Discovery Channels’ “Shark Week 03” and “Oshea’s Adventure” on Animal Planet. He has recorded with the Washington Symphonic Brass as well as numerous “President’s Own” Marine Band recordings from 1996 through 2003.

Mr. Phillips has also released the recordings “Stepping Stones for Trombone” Volumes One and Two on the Potenza Music label which contain both moderate and advanced contest solos in the trombone repertoire. “
Mr. Phillips has been a featured participant at the Alessi Seminars in 2005, 2007 and in Italy in 2010 and remains active as a soloist and clinician around the country.

Mr. Phillips grew up in Houston Texas and attended Westfield High School under Director of Bands, Philip Geiger. His primary teachers were members of the Houston Symphony and the Houston Grand Opera and included Jim Pedigo, David Waters and David Kirk. He also studied briefly with Alan Barnhill and John McCroskey of the Houston Symphony as well as Per Brevig of the New York Metropolitan Opera and John Kitzman of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Phillips received both his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degree in trombone performance from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University.

Recordings