Christina Dioguardi, Principal Bassoon

Passionate about tearing down the fourth wall between musicians and audiences, bassoonist Christina Dioguardi regularly performs with chamber groups and orchestras that are igniting a conversation about music. At present Christina plays with Phoenix (Boston, MA) and previously she was a member of the woodwind quintet Fiati Five. In addition to her role as bassoonist with Phoenix, Christina also serves as the orchestra’s General Manager. She has played with the Boston Philharmonic, Unitas Ensemble, Callithumpian Consort, the Atlantic Symphony, the Glens Falls Symphony, and the Genesee Valley Orchestra.

Christina’s love for chamber music was ignited in 2008 when she attended Greenwood Music Camp (Cummington, MA). Since then she has spent her summers exploring chamber music at various festivals including the Bel Canto Institute in Florence, Italy (2009), Chamber Music Campania in Varano, Italy/Sarasota, FL (2013-2016) and Avaloch Farm Music Institute in Boscawen, NH (2015-2017). She has also developed Phoenix’s Parlor Series, which brings chamber music to new and unique Boston-area venues.

Committed to the expansion of woodwind chamber music repertoire, Christina has commissioned new works by Eric Nathan, Whitney George, Cody Forrest, Jason Thorpe Buchanan, and Carrie Magin. She has also worked intensively with other composers such as David Maslanka, Steven Stucky, Rodney Lister, Yehudi Wyner, John Heiss, Christian Wolff, John Zorn, Chaya Czernowin, Kati Agos, and Gunther Schuller.

Christina holds a BM from the Eastman School of Music and an MM and Graduate Diploma from the New England Conservatory, where she worked under the tutelage of Richard Svoboda, principal bassoon of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Christina continually draws inspiration from her teachers past and present, including Charles Bailey, John Hunt, Toni Lipton, Stephen Walt, and Marc Goldberg.

In addition to her work as a bassoonist, Christina is a musicologist who specializes in medieval music, particularly the Italian trecento. Her scholarly interests include Italian and French secular vocal polyphony, notation, manuscripts, paleography, and codicology. Her current research focuses on manuscripts compiled in 14th-15th century Florence, with a particular emphasis on palimpsests, and the modern technology (i.e. multispectral imaging) used to reconstruct damaged historical documents.

She is currently completing her Ph.D. at Brandeis University with a dissertation titled, “Scraping Beneath the Surface: A Study of Trecento Florentine Identity in the San Lorenzo Palimpsest.” She is a recipient of grants and awards from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Brandeis University.

When not playing the bassoon or analyzing trecento music, Christina can be found as a member of the staff at Bar Method Boston or walking around Jamaica Pond. She currently lives in Brookline, MA with her two cats Marvin and Luna.