About

Violinist Simone Porter has been recognized as an emerging artist of impassioned energy, interpretive integrity, and vibrant communication. After performing last season with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the LA Times declared Simone "on the cusp of a major career." In the past few years she has debuted with the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic; and with a number of renowned conductors, including Gustavo Dudamel, Charles Dutoit, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Nicholas McGegan, Ludovic Morlot, and Donald Runnicles. Born in 1996, Simone made her professional solo debut at age 10 with the Seattle Symphony and her international debut with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London at age 13. In March 2015, Simone was named a recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant.

Simone's 2016/17 season marked her Carnegie Hall Debut with the New York Youth Symphony, followed by debuts with the Pittsburgh, Minnesota, San Diego, Indianapolis, Vancouver and Edmonton symphonies, and return engagements with the Seattle, Nashville, and Utah Symphonies. She also made recital debuts with Armen Guzelimian at the Harriman-Jewell Series in Kansas City and in Harris Hall at the Aspen Winter Music Festival, as well as programs in South Carolina, Texas, and Florida. In summer 2017 she returned to the Hollywood Bowl with Nicholas McGegan and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, to the Aspen Music Festival with Ludovic Morlot, and performed with Carlos Kalmar at the Interlochen Arts Festival.

Her current season includes concerts with orchestras in Rhode Island, Albany NY, Eugene OR, Lubbock and Waco TX and Alabama in addition to a return visit to Des Moines and recitals in Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Simone's emergence on the international concert circuit has occurred simultaneously with her studies at the Colburn Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles. During this time she met Gustavo Dudamel and performed with him for her Walt Disney Concert Hall debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 2015. Other debuts during this time include subscription performances with the Detroit, Cincinnati, Houston, Berkeley and Des Moines Symphonies; Baltimore and Hartford Symphony Orchestras; Rochester Philharmonic; and the Florida Orchestra. She also made her Ravinia Festival recital debut, her debut at the Grand Teton Music Festival, and multiple solo performances as a guest artist at the Aspen Music Festival. Having spent her formative years in Seattle, Simone made a rousing homecoming return engagement with the Seattle Symphony in 2016.

Internationally, Simone has performed with the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra in Bogota, Colombia with conductor Gustavo Dudamel; the Orquestra Sinfônica Brasileira in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil; the Costa Rica Youth Symphony; and the City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong. She has also performed with the Royal Northern Sinfonia and the Milton Keynes City Orchestra in the United Kingdom.

Simone is a devoted chamber musician, and will perform in the Seattle Chamber Music Society series with James Ehnes in January 2018. She has appeared in multiple Colburn Chamber Music Society Series concerts with artists such as violinists Arnold Steinhardt and Scott St. John; on the South Bay Chamber Music Society series with violist Paul Coletti; and at the Miami International Piano Festival. Internationally, she has participated in the Prussia Cove Open Chamber Music Sessions and the Koblenz International Music Festival in Germany.

A 2015/16 Performance Today Young-Artist-in-Residence, Simone's performances and interviews have been broadcast nationally on the APM syndicated network on several different occasions. She has also been featured on the renowned syndicated NPR radio program From the Top, hosted by Christopher O'Riley and featuring America's best young classical musicians. Her performance in July 2012 marked her third appearance on the program; her first was in 2007 at the age of 11. Simone made her Carnegie Zankel Hall debut on the Emmy Award-winning TV show From the Top: Live from Carnegie Hall. In June 2016, her featured performance of music from Schindler's List with Maestro Gustavo Dudamel and members of the American Youth Symphony was broadcast nationally on the TNT Network as part of the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award: A Tribute to John Williams.

Raised in Seattle, Washington, Simone studied with Margaret Pressley as a recipient of the Dorothy Richard Starling Scholarship, and was then admitted into the studio of the renowned pedagogue Robert Lipsett, with whom she presently studies at the Colburn Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles. Summer studies have included the Aspen Music Festival for seven years, Indiana University's Summer String Academy, and the Schlern International Music Festival in Italy.

Simone Porter plays on a 1745 J.B. Guadagnini violin on generous loan from The Mandell Collection of Southern California.