About
Ross Venneberg is a 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 co-conductor of the University Band, assistant conductor of the Wind Ensemble and Symphony 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. His recording credits include CDs with the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and Chanticleer, a promotional Pepsi video for Super Bowl XLVIII, and an appearance on the TV show Madam Secretary.
During the summers he has performed at the Aspen Music Festival, Marrowstone Music Festival, Miami Music Festival, and Spoleto Festival USA. He has toured with orchestras in Austria, 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, and the Philharmonie am Gasteig. He has been fortunate to play under renowned conductors Ludovic Morlot, Sir Simon Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, and Michael Tilson Thomas.
Ross has been a featured soloist with the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra, the University of California Berkeley Symphony and the Sitka Fine Arts Camp Orchestra. He has collaborated with the organists of the New York Philharmonic and San Francisco Symphony in solo performances at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine (NYC) and St. Ignatius Church (SF). He has performed chamber music with members of the New York Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, San Francisco Opera, National Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Atlanta Symphony, and the Seattle Symphony.
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, the Northwest Brass Festival Ensemble, and the Sitka Holiday Brass, an ensemble featuring top orchestral, chamber, and solo brass musicians from around the country.
An advocate for education and outreach, Ross is currently the brass instructor at Milwaukee High School of the Arts and a coach for the UW-Milwaukee Youth Wind Ensemble. He 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 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.
Born and raised in Sitka, Alaska, 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.
