About Randy Gloss
A protégé of renowned percussion vanguard John Bergamo and longtime student of tabla maestro Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, Randy Gloss is a percussionist whose background performing several modalities of hand drums, contemporary percussion, and drum set has led to his involvement in many innovative ensembles that fuse world music with new music and jazz. Most notably for his longtime association as a founding member of Hands On’Semble (1997-2021), Gloss has also worked with a diverse array of artists including: Ziggy Marley (Grammy winning album Fly Rasta); violin icon L. Shankar; pianist Larry Karush; Australian popstar Montaigne; percussionist Pete Lockett; Adam Rudolph’s Go: Organic Orchestra and Vashti; Lian Ensemble (including Pangea Project with Djivan Gasparyan; and Medea starring Annette Bening); pan flutist Damian Draghici; singer David Hykes; Vinny Golia’s Large Ensemble; flautist Nicole Mitchell, pianist Dan Siegel; Aashish Khan, Swapan Chaudhuri, Miroslav Tadic, Vlatko Stefanovski; Chitravina Ravikiran; and Poovalur Sriji to name only some; and has contributed percussion to film soundtracks by Danny Elfman, Harry Gregson-Williams, and Gary Chang; television series (Fear Factor); video games (Uncharted 3); recorded for the American Conservatory Theater; Southwest Chamber Music; and several extensive sample libraries for Apple, Ilio, and Native Instruments.
Randy Gloss is faculty at CalArts where he has taught since the late 90’s, overseeing the MFA World Percussion Program (since 2007); from 2015-2020 was the Director of World Music Performance Programs; and 2018-2021 the recipient of the Michel Columbier Performer-Composer Chair at CalArts. Additionally, Randy has taught at UCLA and LA Music Academy (LAMA), and has been a visiting artist/lecturer/clinician at many universities, music schools and conservatories in the U.S. and abroad. Randy Gloss endorses LP Latin Percussion; Remo drumheads; Innovative Percussion drumsticks, brushes and mallets; Paiste cymbals and gongs; and Cooperman frame drums.
