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Kenneth Tse (pronounced cheh), professor of saxophone at the University of Iowa, is certainly one of the instrument's outstanding proponents on any saxophone aficionado's short list. He burst onto the scene in 1996 as the winner of the prestigious New York Artists International Award, which resulted in an acclaimed debut recital at Carnegie Hall. The Alex Award from the National Alliance for Excellence led to another Carnegie Hall recital. And these are but two of the multitude of awards that Tse has garnered in less than a decade and a half.
Now at 38, he is vice-president of the Comité International de Saxophone, the organizing agency of the triennial World Saxophone Congress, and the premier advocate organization for the saxophone. He is well known as an outstanding teacher of his instrument, attracting some of the most talented students in the world to the University of Iowa saxophone studio, to the many clinics and master classes that he leads, and to the international saxophone symposium that he has established in his native Hong Kong. His studio students have won a large number of awards and competitions, including most recently a silver medal in the Senior Wind Division of the prestigious Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition for the quartet Axius, and three of the top four awards in the most recent North American Saxophone Alliance biennial conference's classical competition, the first time that one studio has so dominated that conference.
Tse's response to my query about these successes was typical of his modesty and sense throughout the interview: "I am indeed very proud of their accomplishments. Of course, winning competitions is always a joyful thing for all who are involved. However, as I often remind the students, competitions are great as long as you don't take the results too seriously, winning or losing."
Tse has been an active recording artist since his first CD for Crystal Records in 1998. There is now a total of six Crystal CDs-presenting a wide variety of saxophone repertoire, most of it new, some with assisting artists-as well as four other releases and more in process. However, this article is part of a feature focus on Enharmonic, the boutique label of composer, violinist, used-record entrepreneur (the famous Ars Antiqua in Bloomington,...