The Black Swamp Saxophone Quartet has been presenting unique and exciting performances since its inception in 1986 at Bowling Green State University. The quartet plays a variety of musical styles and selects literature from a vast repertoire of classical, jazz and contemporary music. Many of the works performed have been written for the BSSQ by composers such as: Pulitzer and Grammy winning composer Jennifer Higdon, University of Michigan composer Evan Chambers and Chicago composer Elliott Cless.

The BSSQ has performed at the Bowling Green New Music and Art Festival, Columbus Arts Festival, the Cincinnati Center for Contemporary Art, the Society of Composers Conference, the New Music Chicago Spring Festival, the Phillip’s Collection in Washington D.C., the Lancaster Festival, and The Newport Music Hall in Columbus, Ohio. The quartet has also been artist-in-residence at the Arosa Musikwochen in Switzerland as well as winning first prize in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and finalist in the Martigny (Italy) International Music Competition.

The quartet is currently in the process of recording all saxophone quartet literature in the OMEA Solo and Ensemble list. This list is used by every band director in the state of Ohio as a resource to select established literature for their students to perform and is a member of the Greater Columbus Arts Council’s Artists-in-Schools program.