Midori Goto Violin Midori’s career as a soloist with orchestra and in chamber music performances has spanned over twenty years and takes her throughout the United States and abroad. Her first violin teacher was her mother, and she continued her studies with Dorothy DeLay in the Pre-College program at Juilliard. In 2000, Midori earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology and gender studies from the Gallatin School of New York University, and she will complete the master’s degree program there in the fall of 2004. In 1992, Midori founded Midori and Friends, a nonprofit organization that provides arts and music education in underserved schools in New York City at no cost to the children. In Japan in 2002, she founded an organization, Music Sharing, that has similar goals. Upon receiving the Avery Fisher Prize in 2001, Midori used the monetary award to start a third nonprofit organization, Partners in Performance, which brings high-profile chamber music performances to rural communities across America. This academic year marks her first as the Jascha Heifetz Chair at USC’s Thornton School of Music. Midori is committed to the advocacy of education, community outreach, and the arts, as demonstrated by her spearheading of the three above-mentioned nonprofit musical organizations. In addition, she interacts directly with young people in both musical and nonmusical encounters through several ongoing projects, notably the University Residencies and Orchestra Residencies programs. Manhattan School of Music faculty 2001-2007.

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