Victoria Knudtson

Victoria Knudtson is currently serving as the Assistant Principal/Utility Horn of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Born to a pianist mother and singer father, Knudtson found her artistic voice on the horn when she was 16 years old after a coincidental meeting with her first teacher, Wayne Lu.

In 2014, Knudtson began studying with Jeffery Nelsen at Indiana University. Thanks to the horn department at the Jacobs School of Music, she also benefited from the orchestral pedagogy of Dale Clevenger and studied early music performance on the natural horn with Richard Seraphinoff. During her undergrad, Knudtson spent six months in Vienna, Austria studying the quintessential and historic style of Vienna horn-playing. In 2018, Knudtson joined the St. Louis Brass (a quintet started in 1964 by then-members of the SLSO) and toured around the country with them until they disbanded during the 2020 lockdown.

Knudtson began an artist diploma at the Curtis Institute of Music under Jennifer Montone and Jeffery Lang before acquiring the position with the SLSO in 2019. As a soloist, Knudtson performed with the Indiana University Symphony Orchestra and the Yale New Music Ensemble, and frequently appeared in recitals on the Curtis stage. Knudtson was a horn fellow of the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan with music director Valery Gergiev in 2018, and the Boston Symphony’s Tanglewood Music Center in 2019. Knudtson continues to perform as a guest musician with the renowned all-women’s brass quintet, Seraph Brass, and regularly performs both as a soloist and in chamber groups with the Chamber Music Society of St. Louis, the Ariel Concert Series, and the Live at the Pulitzer series. She ardently enjoys collaborating with composers and performing new music, especially with friends.

Knudtson also plays a leader/teacher role in the St. Louis Symphony’s Peer-to-Peer program, and serves as a faculty member at Heartland Horn Camp in Carol, Iowa. When not on stage or in the practice room, Knudtson is an avid latin dancer in the styles of salsa, bachata, and Brazilian Zouk, and enjoys getting outside to garden or go for walks in St. Louis’s beautiful green spaces.