Marcin Arendt

About Marcin

A native of Poland, Dr. Marcin Arendt is an active chamber musician, soloist, and teacher. As a professor of violin at the University of Memphis' Rudi E. Scheidt School of Music, Dr. Arendt enjoys teaching a thriving studio of undergraduate and graduate students as well as playing with his colleagues on the string faculty in the Ceruti String Quartet. Arendt plays with Iris Orchestra under the baton of Michael Stern where he regularly holds the Isaac Stern Concertmaster Chair and is heavily involved in the orchestra's community engagements. Dr. Arendt also plays with the prestigious Arizona Music Festival in Scottsdale, AZ, and the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra in Columbus, OH.

In addition to teaching at Interlochen, Dr. Arendt is the artistic director of the Memphis in Poland Festival which aims to share the significant musical, artistic, and cultural contributions of Memphis on an international stage.

Arendt has been a soloist with many orchestras including Iris Orchestra and the Memphis Symphony Orchestra. He is the co-founder of Memphis Mix, a blues & crossover band that is a featured ensemble of the Memphis in Poland Festival. He was a member and regular concertmaster of The Sphere Ensemble, and was the featured violinist with the nationally touring crossover-fusion band FEAST. Dr. Arendt's playing can be heard on recordings spanning several genres including a series of chamber works by Jacques Castérède on Naxos Records.

The prize winner of several national and international competitions, Arendt has performed alongside many renowned artists including Itzhak Perlman, Gil Shaham, Yo-Yo Ma, Martin Short, Joshua Bell, Nate Smith, Don Bryant, and Harry Connick, Jr.

Arendt’s major teachers span a variety of pedagogical schools, echoing his own eclectic, holistic, and versatile approach to teaching; they include Aaron Krosnick, Isaac Malkin, Henryk Kowalski, Krystyna Jurecka, Routa Kroumovitch, Alvaro Gomez, and Oswald Lehnert.

When I work with a student, one of the first things I encourage them to develop is a personal connection to the music and techniques they will be studying. In order to get to this point, there are three questions we consider together: what is my purpose in playing music, what are my goals for my music-making, and what steps am I taking to reach those musical goals? I believe that uniquely tailoring my approach to each student based on their own individuality as a player and person, while including them in the teaching process and provoking a thoughtful pursuit of excellence, is a successful recipe for enabling them to better understand their instrument and flourish to their highest capacity.