Clarinet player Gunnery Sergeant Parker Gaims of Los Angeles, joined “The President’s Own” United States Marine Band in September 2013.

Gunnery Sgt. Gaims began his musical training at age 9 and graduated from Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies in Los Angeles in 2007. He attended DePaul University in Chicago where he earned a bachelor’s degree in clarinet performance in 2011. In 2013, he earned a master’s degree in clarinet performance from Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. He studied with Julie DeRoche of DePaul, Larry Combs of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and Steven Cohen of Northwestern.

Prior to joining the band, he was a graduate assistant at Northwestern, a bass clarinet teaching assistant at the Brevard Music Center in North Carolina, and performed with the Chicago Chamber Musicians.

Gunnery Sgt. Gaims performs with the Marine Band and Marine Chamber Orchestra at the White House, in the Washington, D.C., area, and across the country during the band’s annual concert tour. Several notable performances include: Amilcare Ponchielli’s Il Convegno at the International Clarinet Association’s 2019 ClarinetFest; Michael Gilbertson’s The Cosmos for wind quintet in 2019; Louis Cahuzac’s Variations sur un air du pays d’Oc in 2018; Béla Bartók’s Contrasts and Robert Muczynski’s Time Pieces in 2017; Wayne Oquin’s Tower Ascending with the DePaul University Wind Symphony in Chicago; and Johannes Brahms’ Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Opus 115 at the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage in 2014.