My name is Victor LaBozzetta III, and I’m thrilled that you decided to browse my website and learn more about my music!
I’m a percussionist, keyboardist, and composer who was born on Long Island, NY and am now a proud Chicagoan. I’ve performed across the US and, as a composer, have had my music performed across multiple countries on three continents. My compositions are pretty, groovy, fun, quirky, and intricate. I love weaving gorgeous textures out of those qualities and particularly enjoy composing for percussion and percussion ensemble. Individuals and organizations I’ve been commissioned by include Eastman Percussion Ensemble, Michael Burritt, Colleen Bernstein, Dr. Brant Blackard, University of North Florida Percussion Ensemble, Up/Down Percussion, and pax duo. I also had a brass quintet premiered by the US Army Band Brass Quintet at the Kennedy Center after winning their National Association for Music Education’s Young Composers Competition at age 14.
As a performer, I got an early start. I started taking drum lessons at 4 and piano at 7. I had a lot of wonderful opportunities to perform in and around Long Island with groups like Stony Brook Orchestra (with whom I premiered my Concerto in E-flat for percussion and orchestra at age 14), Atlantic Wind Symphony, and Sound Symphony Orchestra. I’ve always been an avid rock, jazz, and pop drummer and have played in and with several different bands and have enjoyed every second I’ve spent in the pocket. One of my favorite show-off drummer moments was winning Drum Fight at the now-closed Crazy Donkey on Long Island twice. I started classical and orchestral percussion studies later on and have since premiered numerous new works and appeared on two Eastman Wind Ensemble recordings and one Eastman Percussion Ensemble recording. Recently, I have been getting more interested in early music as a percussionist and performing with my wonderful wife, Lilith Ransburg (a musical polymath – early and modern flutes, keyboards, voice, and conducting to name a few)!
As a Jack Kent Cooke College Scholar, I completed my undergraduate studies in Percussion Performance and Music Theory at the Eastman School of Music, studying with Michael Burritt, Rich Thompson, Matt Curlee and Henry Klumpenhouwer. A recipient of the Presser Award in 2020, I also received an M.M. in Composition at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University studying with Felipe Lara. I work at ERDCO Engineering Corporation in Evanston, IL and in my free time I enjoy jigsaw puzzles, the Legend of Zelda, snuggling my cat Wiggles, and chowing down as an enthusiastic foodie!