Returning in Summer 2025
at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis
THE TEAM
Artistic Director & Host
JENNY KLUKKEN
Jenny Klukken is a marimbist from Minneapolis who combines her classical percussion background with her passion for improvisation-based music like jazz. As a crossover musician, Jenny bridges the gap between virtuosic marimba repertoire and adaptive music-making. She strives to take the instrument to new ears, celebrating its versatility in a wide range of genres.
Klukken first moved to Minneapolis to study Percussion Performance at the University of Minnesota with Fernando Meza, Steve Yeager, and Phil Hey. At that time, she was interested in pursing jazz drumset but soon found her home was with the marimba. She spent years studying classic marimba repertoire before returning to her passion for improvisational genres like jazz, folk, Latin, hip hop, and beyond. For years after her formal education, Jenny played in various improv-based ensembles to develop her craft and her creative approach to a mostly-classical instrument. Through a grant from the Metropolitan Region Arts Council, Jenny travelled to Paris, France, in 2018 to study composition and improvisation on marimba with Eric Sammut. This experience studying with Sammut greatly influenced her playing and writing styles and led her to write many new works for marimba + band. In 2019, Jenny travelled to Costa Rica to teach marimba workshop and also learn about traditional Costa Rican folk music. In Guanacaste, Costa Rica, Jenny had the privilege of connecting with marimbists of ages. This trip enriched her connection to the instrument and its tradition in improvisation, which influences her as a performer and educator today.
Soon after, Jenny collected her compositions for marimba + band to crowd-fund, record, and produce her first full length record in 2021 entitled “Color in Motion”, which was the first of its kind: centering the marimba on a jazz/world music album. Color in Motion is filled with Latin percussion, complex rhythms, soaring melodies, and virtuosic marimba playing. It features some of Minneapolis’ finest, inluding: Nachito Herrera (piano), Chris Bates (upright bass), Dave Schmalenberger (drums), Byan Nichols (piano), as well as a connection to Costa Rica with drummer Carlomagno Araya.
Klukken currently teaches marimba at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, as well as teaching percussion at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, MN. She is an active performer and musical collaborator in the Twin Cities area, where she lives. As passionate educator, she regularly visits Universities and high schools to teach and encourage young marimbists to incorporate improvisation and creativity into their musicianship. Jenny is a premier artist with Marimba One of Arcata, California, and a member of the Percussive Arts Society.
MEDIA PRODUCTION
Steve Yeager
Steve Yeager has enjoyed multiple successes in the music business for the past 35 years as an accomplished Composer, Performer, Arranger, Producer and Educator. He's a graduate of St. John's University in Collegeville, Mn with Degrees in Music and Psychology. He later attended Berklee College of Music in Boston where he was the recipient of a Berklee Professional Music Scholarship and a Gary Burton Jazz Masters Incentive Award. Steve taught for 10 years (2000-2010) at the University of Minnesota Music Department as adjunct faculty, teaching Vibraphone, Jazz and improvisation. From 2010 - 2015 Steve was the program specialist and LOGIC certified trainer at the Minneapolis Media Institute, a 2 year technical college where graduates received an Associates Degree in Audio Recording and Production. From 2015 - 2020 Steve taught the Music/Media course at STEP High School in Anoka, Mn. Course work included LOGIC, music theory, music biz and video production. As a recording artist, Steve has released a plethora of music art. He writes and produces music in a variety of genres and distributes these recordings on all platforms. His music has been used in Movies, TV shows, and Multimedia.
Program Adviser
Eri Isomura
Eri Isomura is a percussionist and marimbist from St. Paul, Minnesota. Eri is a founding member of 10th Wave Chamber Collective, a Twin Cities-based ensemble featuring classical music of the 20th and 21st centuries, which served as an MPR Class Notes Artist ensemble for 21-22. She is also an Ensemble Artist of the Heartland Marimba Ensemble since 2019. She has recently performed in a variety of musical styles with the Minnesota Opera, Duluth Symphony, Theater Mu, Cantus, National Lutheran Choir, Zeitgeist, Border CrosSing and others. Recording projects include the album "Twelve Months in Minnesota" (2023) consisting of percussion solos composed by Asuka Kakitani, "Musical Moments for Cello and Marimba" (2021) with her father Sachiya Isomura, a former cellist in the Minnesota Orchestra, "Champagne Confetti" self-titled pop classical album(2023), among others.
While studying at the Boston Conservatory, she was a member of the New England Philharmonic and performed with the Brookline Symphony Orchestra. She performed for the "Times Two Series," a new music initiative based in Boston. She performed in John Luther Adams' piece Inuksuit, a percussion piece written for the outdoors at the Tippett Rise Music Festival, Bravo! Vail Music Festival, and Aspen Music Festival. She has commissioned and/or premiered works for marimba by local composers such as Asako Hirabayashi, Asuka Kakitani, Michael Maiorana, Ian A Cook, Elwyn A Fraser Jr., Jonathan Posthuma, and others.
As an educator, Eri was percussion faculty at St. Olaf College from 2018-2023, and a percussion class teacher at Yinghua Academy 2020-2023, and President of the Percussive Arts Society Minnesota Chapter. She has been a clinician at the Minnesota Percussion Association, adjudicated local competitions and high school solo and ensemble days, and teaches private lessons. As a piano instructor she is a member of the Minnesota Music Teachers Association as well as the Minneapolis Music Teachers Forum. She has been a guest panelist for the Minnesota Orchestra Pre-Concert Talk and St. Olaf Arts Entrepreneurship, as well as a guest on music podcasts.
Eri’s diverse musical background began with classical piano with Jean Krinke and percussion with Robert Adney. She continued her percussion and marimba studies with David Hagedorn, and drumset with Phil Hey at St. Olaf College, where she received her B.M. in Percussion Performance with Distinction in 2011. She completed her M.M. in Percussion Performance at The Boston Conservatory under the tutelage of Keith Aleo, Doug Perkins, Samuel Z Solomon, and Nancy Zeltsman.