10 Facts About Heidi Lehwalder

Heidi Lehwalder is internationally renowned as one of the world's greatest harp prodigies, and as the final student of master Carlos Salzedo.

Heidi Lehwalder was the first recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize, later to be renamed the Avery Fisher Career Grant.

Heidi Lehwalder was given a harp at the age of seven by her mother, who was a cellist with the Seattle Symphony, and Heidi Lehwalder made her debut performing with the Seattle Symphony at nine.

Heidi Lehwalder studied with Carlos Salzedo at his music colony in Camden, Maine for two summers beginning in 1960, and it was Salzedo who prepared her to play in The International Harp Contest in Israel in 1962.

On December 23,1963, Heidi Lehwalder appeared on Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts on CBS at the age of 14.

In 1969, Heidi Lehwalder was a recipient of a Rockefeller Grant as well as a Ford Foundation Grant which enabled her to commission Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Colgrass to write Auras, a Concerto for Harp and Orchestra.

Heidi Lehwalder has performed as a soloist with more than sixty-five orchestras throughout the United States, including The New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, The National Symphony Orchestra, The Atlanta Symphony, The Nashville Symphony, The Buffalo Philharmonic, The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, The Oregon Symphony, The Boston Civic Orchestra and has had numerous solo appearances with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra.

Heidi Lehwalder has been a frequent guest with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center as well as numerous music festivals.

Heidi Lehwalder teaches masterclasses internationally, including at the Juilliard School, the Manhattan School of Music, and the 12th World Harp Congress in Sydney, Australia.

Heidi Lehwalder is the founder and was the director of the Fredericksburg Festival of the Arts in Fredericksburg, Virginia as well as the Chamber on the Mountain Series in Ojai, California.