Senior Lecturer of Strings/Harp

Instruments/Expertise: Violin and Viola, Director; String Chamber Music

(213) 740-7704 phone
pmarsh1@adelphia.net
RHM 210

Biography

Peter Marsh, senior lecturer in strings, is director of string chamber music. He played for 23 years (1957-81) as first violin of the Lenox Quartet, the New York Times: “One of the finest quartets this country has yet produced”, Chicago American: “On a par with the best and second to none of any age or national origin”; Los Angeles Mirror: “A quartet in a hundred”. Their first Beethoven cycle (in New York City) was in 1962. The Lenox Quartet played thousands of concerts, television, radio appearances, and made recordings in the United States and abroad.

Marsh is still very active as a performer. In 2010 he will tour Korea, Alaska (Fairbanks Festival of the Arts), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (XVI International Cello Encounter), and France (Franco-Américaine Rencontre de Musique de Chambre, at the Château de la Bretesche in Missillac).

Marsh’s major studies were with: (1) Hans Letz, who was a student of Joseph Joachim. Letz was a member of the Kneisel Quartet and taught at Juilliard; (2) Scott Willits, who studied seven years with Otakar Ševčik, was Ševčik’s “American Representative” and taught at the American Conservatory (Chicago); (3) Emanuel Zetlin, who taught at the University of Washington, studied with Leopold Auer in St. Petersburg, and was the assistant to Carl Flesch at the opening of the Curtis Institute; (4) With Eva Heinitz, who also taught at the University of Washington, Marsh had extensive chamber music studies and performance. After his time with the Lenox Quartet, Marsh was the first violinist for the Philadelphia, Berkshire, Sequoia, Southwest, and Pacific quartets, as well as Picasso Trio (violin or viola), Palo Verde, Amici, and Rio Trios. As concertmaster, Marsh played with American Sinfonietta, Seattle Symphony, Seattle Opera, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Colorado Festival Orchestra, and California Chamber Symphony. He has collaborated in concert with artists such as Leon Fleisher, Stanley Drucker, Menahem Pressler, and Eudice Shapiro.

Marsh’s full-time, full-professor faculty appointments include Indiana University, Ithaca College, and Western Washington University. Full-time faculty positions with the Lenox Quartet were at Grinnell College (1962-1969) State University of New York at Binghamton (1969-1975). Also, Marsh was artist/faculty at Aspen, Tanglewood, Ravinia, Spoleto, Fairbanks, and other festivals. Additionally, Marsh was the conductor of the Western Washington University Symphony, Young Artists Chamber Orchestra of the Young Artists Program in Chamber Music at SUNY Binghamton, where he was president of Artists Development, Inc. He served on music panels of New York State Council of the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and is a founder of Chamber Music America. A Life Member of the American String Teachers Association (ASTA), he contributed numerous articles when he was editor of ASTA magazine’s Violin Forum.