Performances by Andy Hudson have been hailed as “a treat for the listener” and have been praised for “an uncommon singularity of purpose, technical virtuosity, youthful vigor and a mature sensitivity.” He has appeared in Carnegie Hall’s ‘Weill Recital Hall,’ at Chicago’s ‘Symphony Center,’ and at the World Congress of the International Alliance for Women in Music, College Music Society conferences in both Canada and the US, and gatherings of the International Clarinet Association in Los Angeles, Orlando, Knoxville, and Ostend, Belgium. Andy won top honors at the 2008 MTNA National Senior Woodwind Competition and has received other prizes in the National Collegiate Solo Competition, the Vandoren Emerging Artists Competition, the Luminarts Foundation Fellowship Competition, and the Ariel Artists ‘Impact Performance’ Competition. Andy has recently performed as guest principal clarinet of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra and the North Carolina Opera, and he was appointed Bass Clarinet/III Clarinetist of the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra in 2020. Other festival appearances include the Lucerne, Bang on a Can, Sewanee, Hot Springs, and Great Lakes Chamber Music festivals.

A noted interpreter of contemporary music, Andy has premiered and commissioned dozens of works to date and has performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on their MusicNOW series, at the New Music Gathering, and with Ensemble Dal Niente, the Chicago Composer’s Orchestra, and the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition’s Grossman Ensemble (with whom he is featured on the 2020 release FOUNTAIN OF TIME). In 2018, he was clarinetist for the workshop performance of Augusta Read Thomas’s opera “Sweet Potato Kicks the Sun,” sponsored by the Santa Fe Opera. Andy also performs with the Zafa Collective and earspace, and was a founding member of the trio F-PLUS. Andy is clarinetist with the mixed sextet Latitude 49, which recently released its sophomore album WAX AND WIRE on New Amsterdam Records. Latitude 49 has held residencies at Princeton University and Baylor University, and has been the recipient of grants from the Barlow Endowment, the Fromm Foundation, Chamber Music America, and the Aaron Copland Fund.

Andy is currently Assistant Professor of Clarinet at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and each summer joins the Artist-Faculty of the Tennessee Valley Music Festival. Previously, he held teaching positions at Northwestern University and Lake Forest College, and he has been the North Carolina State Chair for the International Clarinet Association since 2019. Andy earned his DMA in Clarinet Performance with a Cognate Certification in Music Theory from Northwestern University, where he also earned his Master of Music degree. He earned his Bachelor of Music degree from Columbus State University’s Schwob School of Music. His primary teachers have included Steve Cohen, J. Lawrie Bloom, and Lisa Oberlander. Andy is an Artist-Clinician for Buffet Crampon and an Ambassador for Rovner Products. He performs exclusively on Buffet clarinets and Rovner ligatures.

When he’s not practicing, Andy enjoys running, reading, playing guitar, eating local food, watching baseball, and collecting obscure instruments.