BIOGRAPHY
Carol Brobst has enjoyed a long career both as a modern and baroque violinist and violist. She spent 13 years as a violinist in the Richmond Symphony Orchestra and 20 years with the National Gallery Orchestra. She performed with various East Coast baroque ensembles, including Opera Lafayette, Washington Bach Consort, Bach Sinfonia, Modern Musick, and the Orchestra of the 17th Century and with many choral ensembles including the Handel Choir of Baltimore. Carol has also performed with Americantiga, an early music ensemble specializing in Brazilian colonial period music. She appears on the premiere early music recording of Jose’ Mauricio Nunes Garcia’s 1816 Requiem. Other recordings she can be found on include Sacchini’s Oedipe a Colone with Opera Lafayette and Handel’s Alexander’s Feast with Bach Sinfonia. She participated in baroque performance practice masterclasses with Simon Standage, Jaap ter Linden, and Elizabeth Wallfisch. Carol can currently be heard performing with Manassas Ballet Theatre Orchestra for the company's frequent ballet performances at the Hylton Performing Arts Center in Manassas,VA.
As a member of the Brobst family of violinmakers, Carol learned a myriad of skills in string instrument repair from her father and grandfather. She was a fulltime employee of the Brobst Violin Shop for many years and also studied violinmaking with Karl Roy of the Mittenwald School of Violin Making.
Her teaching experience goes back 35 years and she has been teaching continuously since then. In 1994, Carol moved to Richmond, Virginia and began operating a full time studio called the Village Academy of Music. To round out the musical environment for families of students, she invited a variety of instrumental and vocal teachers to share the teaching space. The studio presented solo and chamber recitals throughout the year and became the home of the Richmond Summer Music Exploration Institute, a two week long intensive study program for aspiring music students. Each day Carol led the students through daily classes in music history, theory, conducting and chamber music. Evenings were filled with fascinating seminars on jazz improvisation, early music demonstrations, violin-building and the classical music industry presented by invited experts. The Institute was so popular that many of the students extended their music theory and chamber music studies into the school year. Most of the participants in the program are now in professional music careers. During her time in Richmond, she co-conducted the Richmond Symphony Youth Concert Orchestra. In 2001, Carol took a public school position as an elementary string teacher. She gave many youngsters their first exposure to the joys and trials of playing a stringed instrument and also co-directed the school system's youth orchestra program. From 2011-2017 she was a teacher in the DC Youth Orchestra Program, teaching beginning violin classes and coaching the upper strings. She currently enjoys teaching in her home studio in Woodbridge, VA.
Carol’s musical interests do not stop with the violin. She also trained in classical harp performance and is currently studying voice. She sings in the Washington, DC early music ensemble, Collegium Cantorum. An avid fan of music of world cultures, she has also been involved in a variety of ensembles such as a Bulgarian vocal ensemble, Finnish folk choir, Georgian vocal ensemble and a Brazilian percussion band. Her other hobbies include beadweaving and fiber arts and she exhibits her creations at the Torpedo Factory in Old Town, Alexandria.