Martin Andersen

[Please Also Visit Martin Andersen’s Website at www.njviolaviolinteacher.com]

Martin Andersen, violist and violinist, has been a member of the Grammy-winning New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, that state’s largest arts organization, since 1979. The NJSO performs 125 concerts each season and is based at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark. He is also an active freelance musician in the NY/NJ metro area. As a result, he has had opportunities to travel: three tours to Japan with New York Symphonic Ensemble, one to Korea with New York City Symphony at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, two NJSO residencies/tours in Ireland, performing orchestra and chamber music at the AIMS Festival in Graz, Austria, and a U.S. tour with Tenor Andrea Bocelli. He has also spent his Augusts since 1990 performing orchestral and chamber music at the Grand Teton Music Festival in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Martin has appeared as soloist with the Hawthorne Chamber Symphony, the Hudson Chamber Symphony, the South Orange Chamber Orchestra, and at the Bedford Springs Music Festival.

Teaching has always been important to Martin’s musical life. Beginning as a tutor to his teacher’s younger students while in his teens, he maintains a private teaching studio of violin and viola students of all ages and levels, and specializes in Suzuki Talent Education ("Suzuki Method"). He was Founding Faculty of the Preucil School of Music, taught at the Preparatory Division of Brooklyn College, was on the faculty of Seton Hall University, and was Artist-in-Residence at Stevens Institute of Technology. Martin coaches the Academy Orchestra and the Lieberman Ensemble, which are part of the NJSO Academy educational programs. He has performed and taught master classes throughout New Jersey as a member of the Academy and NJSO String Quartets, including at Rowan University.

Pestering his parents for a violin from age five, Martin began music studies in Iowa City, Iowa, with Doris Preucil, a pioneer of the Suzuki Talent Education. Switching his performance priority to viola in his teens, he graduated Bachelor of Music Cum Laude from the University of Iowa; and obtained his Master of Music degree from Boston University, studying with Walter Trampler, Eugene Lehner, and William Kroll. Martin spent five summers at Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School where his teachers included Leslie Parnas, Roman Totenberg, Artur Balsam, John Graham, Karen Tuttle, Ani Kavafian, Georgio Ciompi, and Toby Appel. He has also studied privately with Karen Tuttle, John Graham, Joyce Robbins, and Toby Appel, the latter made possible by a three year Mellon Foundation Professional Development Grant.   

Martin and his wife Christina, a floral designer and owner of Christina Andersen Floral Design LLC, live in Hoboken, NJ.