Biography

Pianist Garret Ross is an experienced soloist and avid chamber musician with a wide ranging repertoire. He is the founder and Artistic Director of the Apollo Music Festival. Garret has performed on stages and series across the USA including Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series in Chicago, The Roerich Museum in NYC, the Courtroom Concert Series in Saint Paul MN, and Music Northwest in Seattle WA.

As a soloist, Garret gave the World Premiere of Gregory Vajda’s Csardas Obstine with the Texas Festival Orchestra and the Music in The Mountains Festival Orchestra. Other concerto appearances with orchestra include the repertoire of Bach, Beethoven, Grieg, and Rachmaninoff. In recent years Garret has performed and taught masterclasses at many festivals and Universities: the Bermuda Piano Festival, Midsummer’s Music, SUNY New Paltz, Louisiana State University, Humboldt University, Lewis and Clark College, among many more. As a student Garret attended numerous festivals including the Aldeburgh Festival studying with Menahem Pressler, the Banff Centre studying with Thomas Sauer and Colin Carr, and the International Festival-Institute at Round Top.

Garret’s principal teachers are Alexander Braginsky and Eteri Andjaparidze. Both Braginsky and Andjaparidze studied at the Moscow Conservatory, where they studied with Alexander Goldenweiser and Vera Gornostaeva, respectively. Garret hopes to continue this tradition of piano playing through his performances and teaching. An active teacher himself, Garret teaches students throughout the Twin Cities, and conducts masterclasses at universities throughout the United States. He is on the faculty of The Saint Paul Conservatory of Music.

Garret lives in North Minneapolis with his partner Justin, cat Marzipan, and Doberman Reginald Barclay. He enjoys cooking, gardening, and traveling.