Jane Boxall, marimba

“She is pure fire.”Virago magazine

“Jane brings absolute technical mastery to everything she does. What makes her exceptional is that she brings absolute presence, heart and feel too.” —Michael Chorney

Award-winning percussionist Jane Boxall is “in a genre of one,” according to 7Days magazine. Jane keeps a busy performance schedule as a solo marimbist and drumset artist, working across diverse musical genres. Jane has performed in concert halls, art galleries, cafes, castles, kindergartens, hospitals, universities, forests, and festivals from London to Chicago, and Manhattan to Seattle. She has appeared with the Vermont Symphony Orchestra, Guildhall Symphony Orchestra, Prairie Ensemble and the Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble. In 2012, Jane premiered Garry Jones’s Concerto for Park Bench and Orchestra with the Event In A Tent Festival Orchestra – “I’ve never heard a park bench played so passionately,” stated the composer.

With pianist Rose Chancler, Jane is a founding member of Ricochet Duo; and in 2011, Jane co-founded the non-profit music camp Girls Rock Vermont.

Jane’s compositions for percussion ensemble are widely performed from Texas to Hong Kong; her studio recordings have received radio airplay across the United States, on the BBC and on the Dutch radio stations Concertzender and Radio Mona Lisa. Her recordings of Nancy Van de Vate’s marimba compositions are released on the Naxos label. Jane hasJane_B Quotes shared stages and bills with Bradford Reed, Sheesham & Lotus, Vernon Reid, Myra Flynn, Gregory Douglass, The Life and Times, Brzowski, Cage, The Slackers, Les de Merle and Danny Seraphine.

Jane is one of a very limited number of marimba artists worldwide to have developed an 8-mallet technique. Her 2012 album, Zero to Eight Mallets, has been enduringly popular with percussionists and non-percussionists alike. An album review in the Percussive Arts Society’s magazine Percussive Notes stated: “Jane Boxall’s CD is an eclectic mix of 100 years’ worth of music masterfully performed on marimba…Throughout the recording, Boxall’s performance is consistently excellent.” Of the 0-8 mallet concert program, composer and percussionist Brian Johnson opined,“It is highly interesting, entertaining and intelligent.

Deeply committed to the development of art music for percussion, Jane continues to seek and create innovative and adventurous programs. In 2013, Jane was the recipient of a grant from the Vermont Community Foundation, which enabled her to undertake the inaugural “Portable Percussionist” tour on foot from Canada to Massachusetts. Jane commissioned local composers to write “portable” concert pieces then hiked the Long Trail through the state of Vermont, stopping along the way to perform solo percussion recitals. Composer Dennis Bathory-Kitsz commented: “Jane Boxall’s Portable Percussionist was a brilliant presentation. She held the audience spellbound with the simplest of materials — rocks, sticks, pots, and even the zippers on her pack. One composition student later said, ‘My mind was completely blown. I have to re-think Jane_B Quotes2aeverything about composing’.”



In 2014-2015 and beyond, Jane is touring internationally as a concert artist, session drummer and clinician. Jane plays and endorses Vic Firth sticks and mallets, Coe Percussion marimbas and District Drum Company snare drums. She is a contributing writer for Tom Tom Magazine, and an in-demand studio and live percussionist.

Born in England and raised in Scotland, Jane completed her BA and MA in Music at the University of York (UK), and her Doctorate in Percussion Performance at the University of Illinois (USA).

“Jane’s rhythmic sensibility is innovative and refreshing, which solidifies her as one of the most mindful and intuitive players in my book.”   —Gregory Douglass