Eden MacAdam-Somer is a world-renowned violist, fiddler, vocalist, percussive dancer, and educator who Chairs the Department of Contemporary Musical Arts at the New England Conservatory of Music (Boston), where she teaches courses on Women in Music and Folk Music of the United States, coaches folk and classical chamber music ensembles, and works with students on performance and concert production. Outside the classroom, Eden maintains an active, eclectic international performance and recording career as a soloist and with such bands as ESP, Notorious Folk and the Klezmer Conservatory Band. She lives in Boston with her husband, (videographer/photographer Aaron Hartley) and their three children, one cat, and a number of chickens.
Eden MacAdam-Somer is one of the most exciting and versatile musicians performing and teaching today. Her music transcends genre through soaring violin and fiddling, vocals, and percussive dance. She has been a featured soloist with symphony and chamber orchestras, jazz and swing bands, and Eastern European and American folk ensembles, and adores playing for dancing of all kinds. As an educator and composer/improviser, Eden has been a guest artist at such institutions as the Afghanistan National Institute of Music and the Dundalk Institute of Technology, and a featured performer at the Eastbourne and Beijing International Music Festivals, in addition to maintaining a full-time studio at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. With her contemporary duo, NotoriousFolk, she has toured across the continental United States, and performed and taught in Alaska, Hawaii, India, Iceland, the UK, and Afghanistan. She has written numerous traditionally-inspired tunes and songs, along with works for solo artist on voice, violin, and body percussion, such as Rumi Songs, a partially composed, partially improvised song cycle. Her works are performed internationally, and she has received commissions by such groups as the New Gallery Concert Series, Cuatro Puntos Resident Artists, the Providence Mandolin Orchestra, and the AURA Ensemble. Her 2015 live solo album, My First Love Story, was listed as one of the top ten jazz albums of the year in the Boston Globe.
While growing up in Houston, Texas, Eden studied classical music formally, attending Houston’s legendary High School for Performing and Visual Arts, spending her free time at folk music sessions, working as an arranger and studio musician, and playing gigs with her siblings Batya, Adaiha, and Ilan MacAdam-Somer as a string ensemble. The Houston music scene was a tight-knit community, and the MacAdam-Somers grew up as frequent performers with local college, professional, and community ensembles. Eden holds cherished memories of reading string quartets with their teachers, including phenomenal artists such as Fredell Lack, Laszlo Varga, Ken Goldsmith, Meryl Ettleson, and many others.
In 1993, Eden was introduced to contradancing in Amherst, MA, on a night out at Musicorda Chamber Music festival. When she got back to Houston, Eden tracked down the local dance community and began playing for dances. Thanks to the mentoring of the Houston Area Traditional dancers, she was soon brought to the local Irish session, where she connected with members of a world music music party band, the Gypsies, who took her under their wing. She spent nights playing music of all kinds: Balkan, Eastern European, Klezmer, Jazz, Bluegrass, DAWG, and more…Meanwhile, she earned her BM and MM in classical performance from the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston as a student of Fredell Lack, and the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University as a student of Kenneth Goldsmith.
Eden moved to Boston in 2004 with the intention of auditioning for the Rhode Island Philharmonic, but she was invited to tour with guitarist Larry Unger on the weekend of the auditions…and ended up spending most of the next several years on the road. In 2009, hungering for a way to push her artistry, she discovered New England Conservatory’s Department of Contemporary Musical Arts (then Contemporary Improvisation), and realized that she had found the program where she could develop all sides of her artistic self. As a student, she served as teaching assistant to Hankus Netsky and Ran Blake, performed with Sarah Jarosz and Ari and Mia Friedman as CMA Honors ensemble Sail Away Ladies, and formed the department’s first American Roots ensemble. In 2013 she became the first doctoral graduate of the CMA department and was then hired as full-time faculty. Now, Eden serves as Chair of NEC’s Department of Contemporary Musical Arts and Co-chairs NEC’s doctoral program with Composition faculty Sid Richardson.
Music has brought Eden all around the world, and she is eternally grateful for opportunities to connect and share music with people from so many other cultures. One of the most powerful experiences in her life were the annual visits she made to Afghanistan from 2010 - 2015, where she taught and performed at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music (ANIM). Her work there led to her research opportunities for women as musicians in Kabul, culminating in her Doctoral of Musical Arts Thesis: “Dukhtar-e Afghan – Women and Music in Kabul in the 21st Century.” She maintains close ties with colleagues and students from the ANIM who, due to the political situation in Afghanistan, now mostly live in other parts of the world.
As an educator, Eden is deeply committed to a holistic and creative approach to music education, fostering students’ sonic and rhythmic awareness and self-expression while developing strong technical skills as performers, improvisers, and composers. She encourages students to listen deeply and broadly, to ask questions, respect tradition, and challenge convention, developing their individual voices, regardless of genre or style. She has taught privately for over thirty years, and joined the faculty of the Contemporary Musical Arts Department (then CI) at the New England Conservatory of Music in 2013. In addition, she has helped develop teaching programs at Houston Community College, the Shepherd School of Music’s Preparatory Department, and Southshore Conservatory of Music.
Get in Touch
