Mission Statement

Sandbox percussion expands the breadth and depth of the percussion form through commissions of original work that broaden representation in chamber music. We create new musical experiences by transforming creative challenges into meaningful art that is shared with our community.

Biography

Described as “exhilarating” by the New York Times and “utterly mesmerizing” by The Guardian, the GRAMMY®-nominated Sandbox Percussion champions living composers through its unwavering dedication to contemporary chamber music. In 2011, Jonathan Allen, Victor Caccese, Ian Rosenbaum, and Terry Sweeney were brought together by their love of contemporary music and interest in expanding the percussion repertoire; they have since captivated audiences around the world through visually and aurally stunning performances. Today, the foursome are established leaders in contemporary music for percussion, engaging a wider audience for classical music through multidisciplinary collaborations with leading composers and artists. 

Sandbox Percussion has toured the world—from Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center to the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris to the Beijing Music Festival—and reached mass audiences through NPR’s immensely popular Tiny Desk series, TED Conferences, and film. The group’s 2025 Tiny Desk debut consisted of a genre-defying program of pieces by Andy Akiho and Viet Cuong, two of the most important voices in contemporary classical music. Sandbox Percussion also recorded percussion music for its first feature film, The Wild Robot (DreamWorks, 2024), an animated science fiction film directed by Chris Sanders, with music by Kris Bowers. It received three Academy Award nominations, and a GRAMMY® Award nomination for the score.

Sandbox Percussion is the first percussion ensemble to receive the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant. At the 2024 ceremony, the group performed “Pillar V,” from Seven Pillars, a 2021 feature-length suite for percussion quartet composed by Akiho and commissioned by Sandbox Percussion, with stage direction and lighting design by Michael VQ. The New York Times praised Seven Pillars as “a lush, brooding celebration of noise” and “as pure as music gets.” It was nominated for two GRAMMY® awards—Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance and Best Contemporary Classical Composition—and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Since the world premiere, the group has taken Seven Pillars on tour around the globe.

A highlight of Sandbox Percussion’s 2026–27 season is the completion of Pentalateral and its premiere in full. The group’s ongoing collaboration with Andy Akiho—resulting from a 2024 Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation commission—builds on the success of the Seven Pillars, bringing to fruition the artistic potential that was cultivated throughout the collaborative process for the earlier piece, this time with Akiho joining on steel pan to form a powerful quintet. The five musicians, who share a distinctive synergy, will continue to develop, complete, and record the hour-long piece and take it on tour beginning in the spring. The live performance will again incorporate visual elements by Michael VQ. The movement “Pentalateral I” is available now on all streaming platforms.

Throughout the season, Sandbox Percussion presents wide-ranging programs that highlight some of the most important composers of our time at major venues for contemporary music, including Steve Reich at Trinity Church, Christopher Cerrone at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Andy Akiho at 92nd Street Y. The group also appears at Yale University, the Phillips Collection (Washington, D.C.), Chamber Music Northwest (Portland), and Schubert Club at Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), and UCSD, San Diego, among other prestigious venues and festivals.

Another season highlight is the group’s residency at Trinity Church to celebrate Steve Reich’s 90th-birthday year. One of the major figures in American music and a world-renowned composer, Reich has influenced and guided the forward-looking ethic of Sandbox Percussion since the group was formed. The programs feature Tehillim, Traveler’s Prayer, Proverb, and Jacob’s Ladder—in collaboration with Trinity Church’s groundbreaking new-music ensemble NOVUS and singers from the Trinity Choir—as well as Clapping Music and Drumming, a masterpiece of early-1970s minimalism and a definitive work in the repertoire. Reich’s intricate music for percussion and voices will be complemented by select works from Caroline Shaw, Andy Akiho, Viet Cuong, Jessie Montgomery, and others.

In 2026–27, Sandbox Percussion returns to the 92nd Street Y on two separate occasions, expanding its relationship with the eminent Upper East Side center for arts, music, and culture, where Sandbox Percussion has appeared every year since 2024. In the fall, the group performs Seven Pillars, returning in the spring for the world premiere of Pentalateral, with Akiho. Additional performances of Pentalateral take place at University Musical Society, University of Michigan; and Chamber Music Northwest, Portland. Seven Pillars will also be performed at String Theory at The Hunter, Chattanooga.

At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Sandbox Percussion presents two shows featuring selections from the celebrated composer Christopher Cerrone, whose music was featured on the ensemble’s GRAMMY-winning 2025 album Don’t Look Down, an album that “stretches and challenges the listeners’ ears” (BBC Music Magazine), praised by Musical America as “imaginative, original, and addictively effective.” The album won the 2026 GRAMMY® Award for Best Engineered Album, Classical (engineers Mike Tierney and Alan Silverman), and was nominated in two additional categories: Best Classical Compendium, and Best Contemporary Classical Composition (the title piece).

Another season highlight is the world premiere of Concentric Circles, the latest piece for percussion and orchestra by Viet Cuong, a frequent Sandbox Percussion collaborator. His green energy and environment-themed percussion concerto Re(new)al, premiered by the Albany Symphony in 2018, has become a calling card for Sandbox Percussion, and the world premiere recording was recently released on Albany Records. The new Concentric Circles will also be premiered by the Albany Symphony as part of its 2027 American Music Festival. 

Other 2026–27 highlights include a performance at the Phillips Collection, in Washington, D.C., where Sandbox Percussion revisits Michael Torke’s BLOOM, captured in a stunning 2024 recording; performances of Vivian Fung’s 2026 piece Goddess//Insect, featuring violinist Kristin Lee, at Music@Menlo, in the San Francisco Bay Area; and at Concert Nova, Cincinnati. A work for violin and percussion quartet, Goddess//Insect showcases the diverse interplay that is possible between instrumental forces. It was performed last season at Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. 

At Schubert Club at Walker Art Center, Sandbox Percussion performs Simeon ten Holt’s minimalist masterwork Canto Ostinato (featuring Matthew Aucoin and Conor Hanick on piano), a piece shaped by softly chiming pulses and enthralling harmonic shifts. The group’s arrangement for percussion quartet and two pianos was performed at Lincoln Center’s Summer for the City festival, among many other venues. The recent recording with Metropolis Ensemble and Erik Hall (out now on Western Vinyl), was selected by NPR as one of “The albums and songs of 2026 that we love the most (so far).”

Last season, Sandbox Percussion and the Tyshawn Sorey Trio presented Max Roach at 100, a collaborative tribute that celebrates the legacy of the influential jazz drummer. Each group performs its own set first, followed by Sorey’s Cogitations, composed for the two groups joining forces as a septet. “Throughout the performance, Sandbox members displayed the rhythmic affect just as easily as their melodic prowess shined,” wrote CapitalBop about a recent performance at the Library of Congress.

Sandbox Percussion’s upcoming album, available this fall on the Cold Blue Music label, features Prophecies of Fire, a work for percussion quartet by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Luther Adams. “I’ve come to regard these four young men as the foremost interpreters of my percussion music,” writes Adams in his program note. “And I welcomed the invitation to compose Prophecies of Fire—a concert-length work—specifically for them.” The group gave the world premiere at Chamber Music Northwest in 2024.

Another album to be released this season features Christopher Theofanidis’ Drum Circles, a concerto for percussion quartet, performed by Sandbox Percussion with the Albany Symphony and David Alan Miller. The piece was commissioned by Robert van Sice, a mentor to Sandbox Percussion.

Besides maintaining an international performance schedule, Sandbox Percussion holds positions at The New School’s College of Performing Arts, where they have created a curriculum with entrepreneurship and chamber music at its core, and the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University.

Sandbox Percussion has led masterclasses and coachings across the United States, including at Curtis Institute, the Juilliard School, the Yale School of Music, and the Peabody Institute. In 2016, the Sandbox Percussion Summer Seminar was founded, which invites percussion students to rehearse and perform today’s leading repertoire for percussion. The 12th Seminar takes place at The New School this season. Sandbox Percussion launched the Creator Mentorship Program in 2022, a commissioning program for early-career creators who are selected to compose a new work and receive funding for workshops and development.

Sandbox Percussion endorses Pearl/Adams musical instruments, Zildjian cymbals, Vic Firth sticks and mallets, Remo drumheads, and Black Swamp accessories. sandboxpercussion.com