Kay Stern

(She/Her)
Kay Stern teaching while holding violin

Contact

Office 308

Departments

Violin

Courses Taught

Applied Lessons

Violin Performance

Violin Orchestral Excerpts

Education

M.M., The Juilliard School

B.M., The Juilliard School

Ensembles

San Francisco Opera, Concertmaster, 1994–Present

Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Concertmaster

Lark Quartet

Q&A

What is your hometown?

Marion, OH

What is your favorite recording?

While growing up, listening to Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra perform Brahms’ symphonies.

What are you passionate about outside of music?

My daughter! (A violinist!) Walks at the beach, reading.

Who were your major teachers?

Michael Davis and Dorothy DeLay.

What is a favorite quote that you repeatedly tell students?

“It is not a dynamic, it is a dynamic-character. It is not a tempo marking, it is a tempo-character.”

What was the defining moment when you decided to pursue music as a career?

When I was a young child, already "playing" the violin, my dad took me to a performance by the Columbus Symphony Orchestra. There was only one woman in the first violin section. My dad pointed to her and told me that I could do that some day.

What was a turning point in your career?

When I was at Juilliard, I became a founding member of the Lark Quartet. Within the first year, we placed in an international competition, we had management, a publicity firm, and a chamber music residency at the newly built Ordway Theater in St. Paul. Our board of directors supplied for us the financial means to take coachings and lessons from whomever we wanted, as often as we wanted. These were profound years in developing my confidence in how and why I play music.

If you weren't a musician or teacher, what do you think you would be doing now?

A lawyer?

If you could play only three composers for the rest of your life, who would they be?

Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert.

What are your most important collaborations?

Chamber music with Robert Mann, Donald Weilerstein, and Joseph Kalichstein.

What recordings can we hear you on?

Concerto and chamber music recordings can be heard on Phillips, Nonesuch, Innova, MusicMasters, Koch International, Gramavision, and Albany Records. Most recently, I am featured on the Violins of Hope album (Pentatone Music label), a live performance recording of chamber works performed on restored Holocaust instruments.

What is your unrealized project?

To perform all of the Haydn quartets.

Biography

Kay Stern is the Concertmaster of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, a position she has held since 1994.

She is Professor of Violin and Chamber Music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. In the past, Kay served as assistant to Dorothy DeLay at the Aspen Music Festival, assistant to the Juilliard Quartet at the Juilliard School and held faculty positions at the Cleveland Institute of Music, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the Music Academy of the West. She has taught and coached at various music festivals around the world and been in residence at Wellesley College and San Diego State University.

Kay has been featured on television and radio. She has appeared in PBS's Live from Lincoln Center, CNN's Women Today, Minnesota Public Radio's A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor and WQXR-NY Robert Sherman's Listening Room. Kay has also contributed several articles in Chamber Music America. As the former first violinist and founding member of the Lark String Quartet, she performed and gave master classes throughout the United States, Europe and Asia.

Some of Kay's Concertmaster positions include the Orchestra of St. Luke's, Concordia at Lincoln Center, the Cabrillo Music Festival, the Cleveland Chamber Symphony and the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra. She regularly performs as Concertmaster for many movie sound tracks and video games recorded at Skywalker Ranch. Kay is an active chamber musician, collaborating with colleagues around the world. She regularly plays for fund raising events and has helped raise money for medical research, schools, arts organizations, student orchestras and political fundraisers. Some of the educational and community programs she participated in include the New York Philharmonic Musical Arts Experience, Young Audiences of NY Children's Programs, Lincoln Center Student Programs and the Minnesota School & Resource Center for the Arts Touring Program, Seaside Music Academy and Pacifica School Volunteers. Her past music festival appearances include the Caramoor, Bard, Olympic and Grand Teton Music Festivals.

Kay attended the Juilliard School as a student of Dorothy DeLay. While at Juilliard, she received full scholarships for her Bachelor, Master's and Doctoral degree programs. She also studied with Michael Davis at Ohio State University. Her concerto and chamber music recordings can be heard on Phillips, Nonesuch, Innova, MusicMasters, Koch International, Gramavision and Albany Records.