Janet Polk

Janet Polk earned her bachelor's degree in music education at the University of Massachusetts/Amherst and her master's in music history at the University of New Hampshire. After graduation from UMass, she taught K-6 classroom music in the Montague, MA public school system for five years. Currently, she is the principal bassoonist of the Portland (ME) Symphony, Vermont Symphony, Opera North and PortOpera.  She has also performed with the Springfield (MA) Symphony, the New Hampshire Symphony, the New Hampshire Music Festival, and Indian Hill Symphony and traveled to Honduras through the Partners of the Americas. As a member of the Block Ensemble, she has won prizes in the International Concert Artists Guild Competition and the John Knowles Paine competition and performed at the prestigious Round Top Festival in Texas. In addition to her performing career, Polk teaches bassoon at the University of New Hampshire and Dartmouth College. Active as a soloist, she has performed concertos with Portland Symphony, Vermont Symphony, Indian Hill Symphony, Furman University Band, UNH Wind Symphony and Dartmouth Wind Ensemble. Several pieces have been written for Polk in the past several years including Gwyneth Walker's "Concerto for Bassoon and Strings" and UNH faculty composer Christopher Kies's "Sonata for Bassoon and Piano." Polk can be heard on the Sospiri Trio recording of Trios of the 20th and 21st Century on the SnowBird label.

B.M., University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 1975
M.A., University of New Hampshire, 1992

MUSI 555: Bassoon 

active soloist with regional orchestras