Michael Thurber is an American composer, songwriter, bassist and actor. He is a co-founder of CDZA, a

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

music collective that performed at the

YouTube Music Awards The YouTube Music Awards (commonly abbreviated as YTMA) is an awards show presented by YouTube to honor the best in the music video medium. History The 2013 edition of the YTMAs were held at Pier 36 in New York City and were broadcast live at ' ...

in 2013. Thurber has composed scores for theater productions such as ''Antony and Cleopatra'' at

The Public Theater The Public Theater is a New York City arts organization founded as the Shakespeare Workshop in 1954 by Joseph Papp, with the intention of showcasing the works of up-and-coming playwrights and performers.Epstein, Helen. ''Joe Papp: An American Li ...

and ''Sugar In Our Wounds'' at the

Manhattan Theater Club Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC) is a theatre company located in New York City, affiliated with the League of Resident Theatres. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Lynne Meadow and Executive Producer Barry Grove, Manhattan Theatre Club has gr ...

. From 2015 to 2016 he was the bassist for Stay Human, the house band on ''

The Late Show With Stephen Colbert ''The Late Show with Stephen Colbert'' is an American late-night news and liberal political satire talk show hosted by Stephen Colbert, which premiered on September 8, 2015. Produced by Spartina Productions and CBS Studios, it is the second it ...

''. He is on the Board of Directors of National Public Radio's ''

From the Top From the Top is an independent nonprofit organization known best for its longstanding NPR radio and PBS television programs with the same name. Co-founded by Gerald Slavet and Jennifer Hurley-Wales in 1995, the organization showcases and develo ...

'' and teaches at New York University's Clive Davis Institute.

Early life

Michael Thurber was born in

Tulsa, Oklahoma Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...

and grew up in

Portage, Indiana Portage ( ) is a city in Portage Township, Porter County, in the U.S. state of Indiana, on the border with Lake County. The population was 37,926 as of the 2020 census. It is the largest city in Porter County, and third largest in Northwest Ind ...

. He graduated high school from the

Interlochen Arts Academy Interlochen Center for the Arts is a non-profit corporation which operates arts education institutions and performance venues in northwest Michigan. It is situated on a campus in Interlochen, Michigan, roughly southwest of Traverse City. In ...

in 2005.

Career

In 2005, Thurber was accepted into

The Juilliard School The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely regarded as one of the most elit ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. He was the first undergraduate to be accepted into both the Classical and Jazz divisions. He was a member of Remington, a rock band he founded in 2005 with

Ross Mintzer Ross Philip Mintzer (born May 26, 1987)Musicbrainz"Ross Mintzer" ''MusicBrainz'', October 30, 2014. is an American musician and performer. He has led the Ross Mintzer Band since its formation in 2012. Mintzer was featured on National Public Radio ...

. In 2007, he performed on NPR's ''From the Top'' with

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

player

Bela Fleck Bela may refer to: Places Asia *Bela Pratapgarh, a town in Pratapgarh District, Uttar Pradesh, India *Bela, a small village near Bhandara, Maharashtra, India *Bela, another name for the biblical city Zoara * Bela, Dang, in Nepal * Bela, Janakpur, ...

Stay Human and bassist

From 2015 to 2016, he was the bassist on

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

's ''The Late Show with Stephen Colbert'' as a member of the

house band A house band is a group of musicians, often centrally organized by a band leader, who regularly play at an establishment. It is widely used to refer both to the bands who work on entertainment programs on television or radio, and to bands which ...

Jon Batiste Jonathan Michael Batiste (born November 11, 1986) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, bandleader, and television personality. He has recorded and performed with artists in various genres of music (Stevie Wonder, Prince, Willie Nelson, ...

and Stay Human. While in the band, he recorded ''The Late Show EP''. Currently, he performs international in a duo with violinist Tessa Lark.

Cdza and YouTube

In 2012, Thurber co-founded CDZA with

Joe Sabia Joe Sabia is a digital remix artist and video content producer. He is best known as the creator and voice of "73 Questions", a rapid-fire one-take digital series featuring celebrities that he developed for ''Vogue'' in 2014. Sabia was named the Se ...

and Matthew McCorkle. CDZA was a

-based music collective that featured over 100 young, conservatory trained performers. As of 2019, the CDZA YouTube channel has over 304,000 subscribers and over 36 million views. In 2012, they created AT&T's "Thank You Notes", a digital ad campaign in collaboration with BBDO. They performed at the first ever

, headlining alongside

Lady Gaga Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta ( ; born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is known for her image reinventions and musical versatility. Gaga began performing as a teenag ...

Arcade Fire Arcade Fire is a Canadian indie rock band, consisting of husband and wife Win Butler and Régine Chassagne, alongside Richard Reed Parry, Tim Kingsbury and Jeremy Gara. The band's current touring line-up also includes former core member S ...

Eminem Marshall Bruce Mathers III (born October 17, 1972), known professionally as Eminem (; often stylized as EMINƎM), is an American rapper and record producer. He is credited with popularizing hip hop in middle America and is critically acclai ...

and M.I.A. Thurber later worked with YouTube's event teams as Music Director.

Theater

Thurber wrote the score for ''

Antony and Cleopatra ''Antony and Cleopatra'' (First Folio title: ''The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The play was first performed, by the King's Men, at either the Blackfriars Theatre or the Globe Theatre in around ...

'', a co-production between

The Royal Shakespeare Company The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs over 1,000 staff and produces around 20 productions a year. The RSC plays regularly in London, St ...

in Stratford, UK and

. In 2013, Thurber's musical ''Goddess'' was accepted into The Eugene O'Neill Musical Theater Conference. From 2012 to 2017, Thurber wrote the music for several of

's Mobile Shakespeare productions including ''

Pericles Pericles (; grc-gre, Περικλῆς; c. 495 – 429 BC) was a Greek politician and general during the Golden Age of Athens. He was prominent and influential in Athenian politics, particularly between the Greco-Persian Wars and the Pelopo ...

'', ''

Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...

'', and ''

Twelfth Night ''Twelfth Night'', or ''What You Will'' is a romantic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written around 1601–1602 as a Twelfth Night's entertainment for the close of the Christmas season. The play centres on the twins Vio ...

''. Thurber also acted in ''

'', performing the role of Antonio. In 2016, Thurber wrote and performed his one man musical ''The Booty Call'', which was produced for a month long run at

The Barrow Group The Barrow Group is a non-profit performing arts group located in New York City focused on empowering actors, writers, and directors through simple, clear, spontaneous storytelling. The company prioritizes accessibility, diversity, and excellence, ...

Theater. In 2018, Thurber composed scores for the plays ''Sugar In Our Wounds'' at MTC and ''Eddie and Dave'' at The Atlantic Theater Company. In 2018, he received a Working Farm residency at SPACE on Ryder Farm.

Concert music and other compositions

In 2015, Thurber wrote ''Three Musketeers: A Play for Instruments''. The piece is a quadruple concerto written for and featuring pianist

Kris Bowers Kristopher Bowers (born 1989) is an American composer and pianist. He has composed scores for films, video games, television and documentaries including ''Bridgerton'', '' Green Book'', ''Madden NFL'', ''Dear White People'', and ''Kobe Bryant's M ...

, clarinetist Mark Dover and violinist Charles Yang. It was premiered on a live radio broadcast with The Interlochen Academy Orchestra. That same year, Thurber also joined the board of NPR's From The Top and composed music for the dance piece "B Sides" choreographed by Tiffany Rea Fisher for Dallas Black Dance. In 2016, he composed "Jam Session", a horn piece for virtuoso hornist William VerMeulen, commissioned by the

International Horn Society The International Horn Society (IHS) is an international organization dedicated to players of the horn founded in June 1970 with a goal to promote horn playing, education and fellowship. A community of over 3500 members from 55 countries around t ...

and a violin concerto "Love Letter" for violinist Tessa Lark. Thurber has written commercial scores for '' Vanity Fair'',

BBC America BBC America is an American basic cable network that is jointly owned by BBC Studios and AMC Networks. The channel primarily airs sci-fi and action series and films, as well as selected programs from the BBC (such as its nature documentary ser ...

and

CollegeHumor CollegeHumor is an Internet comedy company based in Los Angeles. Aside from producing content for release on YouTube, it was also a former humor website owned by InterActiveCorp ( IAC) until January 2020, when IAC withdrew funding and the websi ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Thurber, Michael Living people American double-bassists American bass guitarists Year of birth missing (living people) The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Stay Human (band) members American musical theatre composers American classical composers American male stage actors Songwriters from Oklahoma