Joan Zucker, cello, long-time principal cellist for the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra (now the New Mexico Philharmonic), is a native New Yorker who holds music degrees from Bennington and Ithaca Colleges.
She was first heard by New Mexicans in the mid-seventies, as jazz cellist with the Johnny Gilbert Quartet and Principal Cellist of the Orchestra of Santa Fe. Since then she has performed in many of New Mexico’s ensembles from the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and Opera, to Willy Sucre and Friends and the Santa Fe Chorale.
She has performed with numerous chamber groups, orchestras, and festivals in the United States and in Venezuela, her home for four years.
A versatile musician, she has taught extensively (cello, recorder, voice, orchestra, chamber music, theory, composition and improvisation), both privately and at various institutions including UC Santa Cruz, Ithaca College, and UNM.
Zucker plays a Benjamin Banks cello made in Salisbury, England in 1788.
