Seventeen year-old Eric Simpson began asking his parents
for a violin shortly before his fourth birthday, when he was inspired
by the video Beethoven Lives Upstairs. At the age of four he began
studying with Louise Jaffe. He has been a student of Lee Snyder at
the Settlement Music School since 1997, where he has been awarded
several scholarships over the last several years.
Eric made his first appearance as a soloist with a professional
orchestra in 2001, at the age of 12, with the Ocean City Pops, playing
Mozart's violin concerto No. 3. Since that time he has won multiple
concerto competitions and appeared as a soloist with a number of
orchestras including the Ambler Symphony Orchestra, the Bucks County
Symphony Orchestra, the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra, the Warminster
Symphony, the Delaware County Symphony, and Musica 2000.
Eric in the 11th grade at The Shipley School in
Bryn Mawr, where his favorite subjects are Latin and ancient Greek.
He plays in the Myer Schwartz Advanced Study Piano Trio at the Settlement
Music School. When he's not playing his violin, Eric enjoys Shakespearean
acting, computers, and squash. He has an older brother who is in
college. He lives in Haverford with his parents and his dog DeBeriot,
whom he named after the French violinist and composer.
Eric is currently in his freshman year at Yale, where he is studying with
Syoko Aki at the Yale School of Music. He auditioned into the Yale Symphony
Orchestra, although he deferred joining them due to a conflict with one of his
classes. Instead he is playing, and assistanting the concert master, for the
Berkeley College Orchestra one of Yale's residential colleges. While with the BCO he
will learn conducting. Next semester, he plans on playing with the YSO.
