Born in Minneapolis, MN, Rolf Haas made his Solo Debut when he was 14 years old with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra under Conductor Lynn Harrell, and has since enjoyed a diverse and far-reaching musical life.
In 2013, after years of study with primary mentors Harry Nordstrom, Sally O’Reilly, and Yair Kless, Rolf was given an opportunity to play as part of the same Grammy-Award Winning St. Paul Chamber Orchestra with whom he made his Solo Debut. He has played in the SPCO for the last 10 seasons, During which he has acted as section leader, performed chamber music, played on recordings, educated through community outreach, explored performance styles from the Baroque Period to the Present Day, and collaborated with artists such as Joshua Bell, Andrew Manze, Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Gil Shaham, Thomas Zehetmair Pekka Kuusisto, Richard Egarr and Patricia Kopatchinskaja.
Rolf plays the violin on which Louis Krasner debuted the Violin Concertos of Alban Berg and Arnold Schönberg. Krasner sold the violin to Rolf’s Grandfather, Harry Nordstrom, who then played on it for most of his professional career. In 2013, when studying in Austria, Rolf won an opportunity to tour as soloist playing the Berg Violin Concerto in halls such as the Palace of Arts (Budapest, Hungary) and Lisinski Concert Hall (Zagreb, Croatia) and others. It was then that Rolf’s Grandfather gave him the violin to play for the first time.
He has performed as Second Violin Leader of Kammerakademie Potsdam (Germany), played on a recording with Kammerakademie Postdam with Pianists Evgeni Koroliov and Anna Vinnitskaya, performed with the Münchener Kammerorchester (Germany) and acted as Associate Concertmaster of the Grazer Kammerorchester (Austria). Rolf believes strongly in the importance of cultural stylistic exchange and remains active in Europe.
Rolf’s festival life reflects his interest in both this cultural stylistic exchange as well as his interest in the stylistic language of all eras of classical music. Rolf has performed in such diverse Concert Halls as the Wiener Konzerthaus, the Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater at Bravo! Vail, the KKL Luzern Concert Hall, Beckwith Recital Hall at the Fargo Chamber Music Festival, and the Konzerthaus Berlin. Recent Festival highlights for Rolf have been appearances at Festival Mozaic both as concertmaster and chamber musician, ötztal Meisterkurs in Tirol, Austria as Jury member, Bach Roots Festival as Concertmaster of a period performance ensemble, and Mattheiser Sommerakademie in Germany as Guest Lecturer. He has taken part in Festivals ranging from the Meadowmount School of Music where he performed chamber music with Ulf Hoelscher, to the International Sommerakademie in Salzburg; From the Summer Academy of Music in Krakow, Poland, to the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival where he worked closely on new works with composer Kaija Saariaho.
In 2021, Rolf was named Blake School’s Young Alumnus of the Year, and in the same year received a Performance Leadership Certificate online from Cornell. He has recently been featured on National Public Radio’s “Performance Today”.
From early on, Rolf’s music journey has also involved genres outside of classical music. Playing in bands since he was 12 years old, Rolf has also been acknowledged and respected both as a punk rock and a hip-hop artist (emcee/producer). His former group, Nocturnal Unit, released 3 full length albums and an E.P. Their final songs and recordings combined compositional techniques of conversational chamber music with the sonic palette of hip-hop, and hardcore punk. Currently he is involved with a project called 13 Odd House, through which he will release new creative projects such as writings, music, and a movie/recital series: of which the first film, ‘House of Mysterious Secrets’, was screened in Theaters and on Television in 2022 and featured the music of Bach and Górecki. ‘House of Mysterious Secrets’ was also picked up and adapted to a full length radio special by KYMN in the same year.
Rolf is excited to be joining the Phoenix Symphony as Concertmaster starting in the upcoming 24-25 season
