Sarah Crocker

Violinist Sarah Crocker, a native of Syracuse, New York, joined the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in 2008. Previously, she was a member of the Detroit Symphony and Acting Assistant Concertmaster of the Colorado Symphony during the 2006-2007 season. She has also performed as a member of the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra and as a substitute with Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. In summer 2008, she traveled to Tunisia with Cultures in Harmony, where she taught young classical musicians, performed alongside Turkish oud player Necati Celik, and gave a concert at the ancient Roman coliseum at El Jem. As a founding member of the Verklarte Quartet, Ms. Crocker was a Grand Prize Winner of the 2003 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. She also has been awarded top prizes in the Cleveland Institute of Music Concerto Competition, the Syracuse Symphony Concerto Competition, and the Doreen B. Herzog Young Artists Competition. Ms. Crocker has appeared as soloist with the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra, the Syracuse Symphony, the Up Close and Musical Chamber Orchestra, the Onondaga Civic Symphony, and the Orchestra of the Southern Finger Lakes and regularly performs solo recitals at the Everson Museum in Syracuse, New York. Ms. Crocker holds a Master of Music degree from the Juilliard School, where she was a student of Ronald Copes and Naoko Tanaka, and a Bachelor of Music degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she was a student of David Updegraff. Sarah has attended numerous summer festivals, including the Banff Centre Chamber Music Residency, Yellow Barn Music Festival, the Audubon Quartet Seminar, Kneisel Hall, Music Academy of the West, ENCORE School for Strings, and the Algonquin International Music Festival. She has studied chamber music with members of the Juilliard, Cleveland, Emerson, Audubon, Cavani, and Takacs String Quartets. In addition to her performing activities, Ms. Crocker is dedicated to teaching. Her teaching experiences have included teaching violin privately, coaching chamber music in master class settings, and teaching 2nd- and 3rd-grade aesthetic education classes at Manhattan's P.S. 11 as a Juilliard School Morse Teaching Fellow. Sarah enjoys exploring genres outside of classical music and has appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman, accompanying singer-songwriter Howie Day. She also has appeared regularly on the New York club circuit with the Brooklyn-based band Tryst and the Philadelphia-based performer Sexcop.