Kathryn Nettleman, who joined the Minnesota Orchestra in fall 2009, has performed extensively throughout the U.S. and Southeast Asia, most recently serving for one season as principal bass of the Hong Kong Philharmonic under the Minnesota Orchestra’s former Music Director Edo de Waart.

In prior years working as a freelance musician, Nettleman performed as a substitute with the Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and the Chicago, St. Louis and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestras, as well as the Chicago Lyric Opera.  She was a member of the Naples Philharmonic Orchestra in Florida during the 2001-02 season.  As a chamber musician and solo recitalist she has performed in Hong Kong, across China and at numerous Midwestern venues.  She appears regularly in the Minnesota Orchestra Chamber Music concerts and in the Colonial Chamber Series in Edina.

Nettleman began learning to play violin as a fourth-grader in the New Jersey public schools, switched to bass in eighth grade and worked with Neil Courtney of the Philadelphia Orchestra during her high school years. She studied with additional eminent teachers—Homer Mensch as an undergraduate at the Juilliard School and Donald Palma while a graduate student at Yale. She continued her musical training as a fellow in the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, performing under director Michael Tilson Thomas.  She returned in spring 2011 to serve as a week-long coach and instructor to the current NWS bass players in a special Mahler project led by Tilson Thomas.

Nettleman volunteers weekly for Minneapolis Public Schools as a tutor in reading and language skills, and she enjoys working as a teacher to young bass players. Her husband Charles Block is principal bass of the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra.