Bruce Ridge – États-Unis

Chairperson, ICSOM

Double bassist Bruce Ridge is the chairperson of the International Conference of Symphony and Opera Musicians (ICSOM), a Players’ Conference of the American Federation of Musicians that represents over 4000 musicians in the largest 51 orchestras in the United States. He has been a member of the North Carolina Symphony since 1987.

He began his professional career when he joined the Virginia Symphony at the age of 15. Ridge later studied at the Curtis Institute of Music and the New England Conservatory of Music, where he graduated with Distinction in Performance honors. He has performed at Tanglewood, Interlochen, the Grand Teton Festival, and with the orchestras of Charleston (SC), Jacksonville, and Honolulu.

Believed to be just the second musician from an ICSOM orchestra to chair a music director search, Ridge led the committee that brought Grant Llewellyn to the North Carolina Symphony. He has served as chair of the North Carolina Symphony Players’ Association, on grant panels for the National Endowment for the Arts, and as a member of the City of Raleigh Arts Commission.

He is a contributing editor to the Orchestra Musicians’ Forum and has served as a faculty member for several sessions of the League of American Orchestras Leadership Academy.

Ridge’s double bass teachers include Lawrence Wolfe of the Boston Symphony, and the late Roger Scott of the Philadelphia Orchestra. He also performs on the bass guitar and solo jazz bass for the North Carolina Symphony’s Pops series.