Katherine Needleman
Oboe
Katherine Needleman joined the Baltimore Symphony as principal oboist in 2003, the same year she won first prize at the International Double Reed Society's Gillet-Fox Competition.
In addition to her appearances with the BSO, Ms. Needleman has appeared as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Concerto Soloists Chamber Orchestra, the Haddonfield Symphony, and the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional de Colombia, among many others. She has appeared as guest principal oboist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Atlanta Symphony, Boston Symphony, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, and the New Zealand Symphony. Prior to her appointment in Baltimore, she was principal oboist of the Richmond Symphony and before that, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia.
Ms. Needleman is a founding member of the oboe trio, Trio La Milpa; the woodwind quintet, Astral Winds; and the Mico Nonet, an improvisational ambient chamber music ensemble involving principal players from the Philadelphia Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, and 1970's synthesizers. Ms. Needleman's other chamber music engagements have taken her to Carnegie Hall, Weill Recital Hall, and the Metropolitan Museum in New York; Jordan Hall and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston; the Freer Gallery in Washington, D.C. She has appeared at the Verbier Festival in Switzerland, Italy's Spoleto Festival, the Alpenglow Festival, and the Newport Music Festival. A frequent participant at the Marlboro Music Festival, she has also appeared on two tours with "Musicians from Marlboro."
Devoted to the music of our time, Ms. Needleman has premiered numerous works. She has commissioned works by Luis Prado, Chia-Yu Hsu, and David Ludwig, and gave the American premiere of Brenno Blauth's Concertino.
Ms. Needleman received a bachelor of music degree at age twenty from the Curtis Institute of Music, where she studied with Richard Woodhams. A Baltimore native, she attended high school at the Baltimore School for the Arts. Astral Artistic Services, a Philadelphia non-profit organization, has provided Ms. Needleman with invaluable career assistance. Ms. Needleman has been on the faculty of the Peabody Conservatory since 2005.
