PCO Conductor

Eric Lindholm -- PCO Conductor

Eric Lindholm’s music department faculty page

Eric Lindholm began piano lessons at age six and cello lessons at age eight, never planning to become a professional musician. Piano lessons didn’t last, but playing the cello led to involvement in such orchestras as the Phoenix Youth Symphony and the Arizona All-State Orchestra. A summer at Interlochen gave him an early conducting opportunity, for a few minutes at the end of a reading rehearsal. However, an early interest in math had developed into an adolescent infatuation with physics, and it was as a physics major that he began his undergraduate career at Princeton. He continued to play the cello recreationally at Princeton, joining the University Orchestra and later becoming involved in lessons and chamber music.

For two and a half years, physics went well, but he started to run out of steam. He completed a semester-long research project called "SQUIDs and their use in the study of neuromagnetism," and even knew what SQUID stood for, but the topic hadn’t exactly thrilled him the way he had hoped. Problem sets weren’t sabotaging weekends any more than they had been before, laboratory equipment wasn’t working any less well, and exams weren’t producing any greater anxiety - but it just didn't seem like fun anymore. While his friends used their free time to read up on general relativity, he wandered off to the music library and listened to Mahler symphonies. Eventually, it seemed that he was complaining daily about how annoying physics was and how he would rather be doing music. He tentatively decided to finish his degree and pursue graduate study in music, but realized that legitimate academic credentials in music would probably be of some assistance. Besides, his friends were sick of hearing his complaints, so he followed their advice and changed departments immediately.

As a senior, he was fortunate enough to get involved in several projects, including a student-run production of The Pirates of Penzance and the premiere of a fellow student’s music drama, Antigone. He conducted a piece with the Princeton University Orchestra as part of his senior thesis, and was able to scrape together enough course work to graduate on time and get accepted to a Master's program at Boston University. While receiving more opportunities to conduct, he continued studying the cello as well, and he was able to complete a double major Master of Music degree in conducting and cello performance. He later earned an Artist Diploma through a post-graduate fellowship program at the Yale School of Music. In 1993, he won a prize at the international conducting competition in Besançon, France, and he attended Tanglewood on a conducting fellowship in Summer 1994. He has been featured twice in master classes held by the American Symphony Orchestra League.

Since graduate school, he has worked with orchestras at the professional, college, community, and high school levels. Whether with the Pomona College Orchestra or other groups, he is committed to exploring diverse repertoire, combining contemporary music with old classics, and lesser-known works with audience favorites. He has conducted both orchestra and opera in the United States and abroad. In September 2003, he appeared with the Festival Strings Lucerne as part of the Prague Autumn International Music Festival, conducting a concert in the famed Dvořák Hall of the Ruldophinum. Portions of that program were later broadcast on National Public Radio’s Performance Today. His three trips to Bulgaria have seen him work with the National Radio Symphony and the orchestras of Vratza and Bourgas. His programs there have featured Bernstein’s Jeremiah (Symphony #1), Shostakovich’s monumental Symphony #10, and Bartók’s Piano Concerto #3 (which was receiving its first performances in that country). His other memorable performances have been with the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic, the Norwalk (Connecticut) Symphony, the Savannah (Georgia) Symphony, the State Symphony Orchestra of Sao Paulo (Brazil), the contemporary music groups New Music New Haven and ensemble GREEN, and, of course, the Pomona College Orchestra.

At Pomona, he is a member of the full-time faculty, as an Associate Professor of Music. Each semester, in addition to conducting the orchestra, he is involved in some number of the following activities: coaching chamber music, organizing conducting seminars, teaching an academic course, or running ear-training laboratories. His schedule at Pomona does not leave him with a lot of time for hobbies, but he still tries to practice the cello once in a while, and he has performed on the Friday Noon concert series and as a member of faculty-student chamber ensembles. He is married to Kira Blumberg, a violist with the Los Angeles Opera, the Long Beach Symphony, and other groups; the couple’s daughter Annika was born in June 2003. Last and least, he is an avid, but admittedly poor, basketball player; those who know his game euphemistically refer to him as a "defensive specialist." A more recent interest in racquetball has been marginally more successful, if one looks past the ruptured Achilles tendon he suffered in July 2003 and which went undiagnosed for five weeks, thanks to the bumbling efforts of an HMO that will remain nameless.

Eric welcomes electronic mail for questions about the orchestra, the department, or the college. Contact him at elindholm@pomona.edu or at (909) 607-4208.

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