About
Born and raised in Sitka, Alaska, Ross Venneberg is an active trumpeter, conductor, and educator based in Milwaukee. He is currently a Teaching Assistant at the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee's Peck School of the Arts, where he serves as an assistant conductor of the Wind Ensemble, Symphony Band, University Band, and Assistant Director of the Panther Basketball Band.
Ross has performed with a variety of professional ensembles including the Philharmonia Orchestra (London), Lake Washington Symphony, Seattle Metropolitan Chamber Orchestra, Symphony Napa Valley, St. James Cathedral Brass (Seattle), Seattle Chamber Brass, and The Bay Brass. He has also performed at summer festivals such as the Aspen Music Festival, Marrowstone Music Festival, Miami Music Festival, and Spoleto Festival USA. Ross has toured throughout the United States and in Austria, China, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Slovakia in concert halls such as Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, the Philharmonie Berlin, Smetana Hall, Kurhaus Wiesbaden, Philharmonie am Gasteig, Lincoln Center, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall. He has been fortunate to play under renowned conductors Ludovic Morlot, Sir Simon Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, and Michael Tilson Thomas.
As a soloist, Ross has been featured with the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra, the University of California Berkeley Symphony and the Sitka Fine Arts Camp Orchestra. He has also performed with the organists of the New York Philharmonic and San Francisco Symphony at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine (NYC) and St. Ignatius Church (SF).
As a conductor, he founded and directed the University of Washington Brass, which presented annual Holiday Brass concerts and was a guest ensemble at the 2018 and 2019 Northwest Brass Festival. He served as co-director of the University of Washington Campus Band and conducted the UW Chamber Winds on tour in China. He has also appeared with the University of Washington Wind Ensemble, the Sitka Fine Arts Camp Brass Ensemble, and the Northwest Brass Festival Ensemble.
An advocate for education and outreach, Ross is currently the brass instructor at Milwaukee High School of the Arts and has previously held teaching positions at the Manhattan School of Music Arts-in-Education and Distance Learning programs, and the Sitka Fine Arts Camp. He has presented master classes and/or lectures at the University of Washington, Pacific Lutheran University, Seattle University, Saint Martin's University, Presbyterian College, and in China at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music and Tsinghua University.
Ross earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, cum laude, from Saint Mary's College of California, a Master of Music degree from Manhattan School of Music, and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Washington. His former teachers include David Gordon, Timothy Salzman, Mark Gould, Adam Luftman, and Roger Schmidt.
