Leigh Howard Stevens

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Leigh Howard Stevens is a marimba artist responsible for developing, codifying, and promoting a new method of independent four-mallet marimba performance based on the Musser method. Stevens studied under some of the most prominent percussion teachers and performers of his time, including jazz drummer Joe Morello, marimbist Vida Chenoweth, and he pursued his college studies at the Eastman School of Music under John Beck. His influence peaked in the 1980s, although it carries on through those who studied with him.

Stevens' performance at the first PASIC (Percussive Arts Society Internationl Convention) in Rochester, New York in 1976 was a seminal event for all in attendance. For the first time, many percussion performers and teachers were seeing for the first time someone performing with a quasi-Musser grip but with an unprecendented degree of flexibility. Stevens was not attempting to revolutionize the percussion world; rather, he was merely performing in what he thought was a natural method for the marimba.

"It would be difficult to overstate how different the attitudes and assumptions about four-mallet marimba playing were at the time that MOM was writtng. Since I had been doing an independent roll from the moment I began playing xylophone in 1969, I personally had no appreciation of how "revolutionary" the technique was, but as late as 1976, when I performed at the first Percussive Arts Society International Convention, most percussionists were seeing the independent roll, my "vertical Musser grip", rotary-based strokes and my extended-length birch handles for the first time."--Leigh Howard Stevens, from Method of Movement for Marimba

Mr. Stevens' treatise, Method of Movement for Marimba, first published in 1979 by his own company, Marimba Productions, was widely considered a revolutionary and highly detailed textbook which described Stevens' method for holding marimba mallets, efficient utilization of motion, and included over 500 musical exercises for the student. Method of Movement (often shortened to MoM) was the first textbook to fully describe a complete method for holding and playing with 4 mallets.

Mr. Stevens is also the owner and operator of Malletech instruments and mallets, Keyboard Percussion Publications, and Resonator Records. All of these companies are found on his website, MostlyMarimba.com.

Those who have studied with him include Alex Jacobowitz and the late Nora Davenport.

He is an alumnus of Columbia High School in Maplewood, New Jersey. Most recently, he was inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.

On November 10, 2006, Mr. Stevens was officially inducted into the Percussive Arts Society Hall of Fame during the 2006 Percussive Arts Society International Convention in Austin, Texas.