Jonathan Carney

Violinist and Concertmaster, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra

BSO Concertmaster Jonathan Carney is in his 20th season with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, after 12 seasons in the same position with London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

Born in New Jersey, Mr. Carney hails from a musical family with all six members having graduated from The Juilliard School. After completing his studies with Ivan Galamian and Christine Dethier, he was awarded a Leverhulme Fellowship to continue his studies in London at the Royal College of Music.

After enjoying critically acclaimed international tours as both concertmaster and soloist with numerous ensembles, Mr. Carney was invited by Vladimir Ashkenazy to become concertmaster of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in 1991. He was also appointed concertmaster of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in 1994 and the Basque National Orchestra in 1996. Recent solo performances have included concertos by Bruch, Korngold, Khatchaturian, Sibelius, Nielsen, the Brahms Double Concerto and Vaughan Williams' The Lark Ascending, which was featured as a live BBC broadcast from London's Barbican Hall. He has made a number of recordings, including concertos by Mozart, Vivaldi and Nielsen, sonatas by Brahms, Beethoven and Franck, and a disc of virtuoso works of by Sarasate and Kreisler with his mother Gloria Carney as pianist. New releases include Beethoven’s Archduke and Ghost trios, the cello quintet of Schubert and a Dvorak disc with the Terzetto and four Romantic pieces for violin.

Mr. Carney is passionate about music education and currently serves as Artistic Director for the Maryland Classic Youth Orchestras.

Jonathan is presently on the faculty of the Brevard Music Center, an intensive seven-week summer music festival in the mountains of western North Carolina. As a sought after clinician he also gives master classes throughout the United States and abroad. Mr. Carney is currently a frequent guest concertmaster with The Seoul Philharmonic, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the NSO of Taiwan and the Malaysian Symphony Orchestra.

Mr. Carney performs on a 1687 Stradivarius, the Mercur-Avery, on which he uses "Vision" strings by Thomastik-Infeld. Mr.Carney's string sponsor is Connolly & Co., exclusive U.S. importer of Thomastik-Infeld strings.

Gracie Carney

Violinist

Gracie Carney is highly sought after as a contemporary musician. Since 2018, she has played in and lead IU’s New Music Ensemble where she was also featured as a soloist in 2019 with David Ludwig’s violin concerto, Paganiniana. Earlier that year, Ms. Carney premiered Wake Up Gracie, a violin concerto written for her by Miggy Torres. In 2016, Gracie Carney lead the world premiere of Marcos Balter’s Codex Seraphinius as concertmaster.

Gracie Carney is currently pursuing a Masters in Violin Performance at McGill University’s Schulich School of Music. She recently received a Performance Diploma at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of music where she also graduated with a Bachelor of Music as the Leonard Bernstein Fellow. She has studied violin under the tutelage of Mauricio Fuks and Grigory Kalinovsky as well as baroque violin with Stanley Ritchie.

Gracie Carney’s experience as a serious chamber musician dates back to 2015, where her string quartet were two-time semi-finalists of the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. In 2016, her string trio was awarded the prestigious Reinecke Youth Chamber Music Fellowship. As a student of the Pacifica Quartet, Ms. Carney’s string quartet went on to win the Music in the Vineyards Competition in 2019 and performed alongside the Dover Quartet and the Pacifica Quartet in Napa Valley, California.

In addition to being a violinist, Gracie Carney is founder and Artistic Director of the charity organization, ARTivism: Arts for a Cause. ARTivism is a virtual performance series that raises money for charitable causes. In just two performances, Ms. Carney’s work with the organization helped raise over $2,500.

Gracie Carney is an alumna of the Peabody Preparatory and the Baltimore School for the Arts where she studied violin performance under the instruction of Rebecca Henry.