Heidi Lehwalder, harp

Department: Instrumental Performance
Phone: 206-543-9466
Email: harp@u.washington.edu
Website:

Heidi Lehwalder, harpist, has performed as a guest artist with more than 65 orchestras throughout the United States and Canada, including the New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, the Atlanta Symphony, the Montreal Symphony, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, as well as with the symphonies of Phoenix, Buffalo, Louisville, Wichita, Savanna, Syracuse, and Honolulu.

She has made 55 appearances with the Seattle Symphony and has collaborated with conductors Leonard Bernstein, Claudio Abbado, Erich Leinsdorf, Arthur Fiedler, Gerard Schwarz, Lucas Foss, Andre Kostelanetz, Dennis Russell Davies, and Charles Dutoit. Her recent performances include a 10-city tour with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and two performances during their 2006-07 season at Alice Tully Hall in New York City.

An esteemed chamber musician, Lehwalder has performed in numerous concerts with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center from 1972 to the present. She has participated in the Mostly Mozart, Caramoor, Santa Fe, and Spoleto Festivals. Lehwalder is the only harpist ever to be invited to tour with Rudolf Serkin’s famed Music from Marlboro. During summer 1987, she served as Professor of Harp in Korea’s First International Chamber Music Festival. As a member of the Orpheus Trio, she toured for eight years throughout North America and Europe with flutist Paula Robison and violist Scott Nickrenz. She has also toured extensively with flutist Carol Wincenc.

Lehwalder is the inspiration for numerous harp concerti, both written for and dedicated to her, including Jose Serebrier’s Colores Magicos, Roberto Camano’s Concerto for Harp, and Michael Colgrass’ Auras, as well as Sheila Silver’s From Darkness Emerging for harp and string quintet.

As a recording artist, Lehwalder has recorded for RCA, RCA Red Seal, CRI, Nonesuch, and Vanguard. Her collaborations include recordings with the Orpheus Trio, The Philadelphia Singers, Benedita Valente, Maureen Forrester, James Galway, Richard Stolzman, and the Tokyo String Quartet.

She has appeared on national television on the Firestone Hour, Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts, NBC’s Today Show, CBS Cable with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and PBS, both in joint recital with the Annapolis Brass Quintet and during the 1998-99 season as part of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Star-Studded 30th Anniversary Gala.

Lehwalder is the Founder and Artistic Director of the Fredericksburg Festival of the Arts, which has been nationally broadcast on NPR for 17 of the last 19 seasons. She also has served as Artistic Director of Belle Arte Concerts in Seattle and as Artistic Administrator of the Seattle International Music Festival. Lehwalder was Professor of Harp at the College of William and Mary and the University of Virginia from 2003 to 2006.

She is the recipient of a Ford Foundation Grant and a Rockefeller Foundation Grant, and has the distinction of being the first recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize.

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