Vijay Gupta
Coalition Member
Vijay Gupta is the founder and Artistic Director of Street Symphony, a community of musicians creating spaces of connection for people in reentry from homelessness, addiction and incarceration in Los Angeles. Vijay is a co-founder of the Skid Row Arts Alliance, a consortium dedicated to creating art for – and with – the largest homeless community in America and he serves as the Senior Artistic and Programs Advisor for Young Musicians Foundation.
For his work in “bringing beauty, respite, and purpose to those all too often ignored by society”, Vijay was the recipient of a 2018 MacArthur Fellowship. In 2020, he delivered the 33rd annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy for Americans for the Arts and his 2010 TED Talk, “Music is Medicine, Music is Sanity”, has garnered millions of views.
His work embodies his belief that the work of artists and citizens is to make a sadhana – a daily practice – of the world we envision. Hailed by The New Yorker as a “visionary violinist…one of the most radical thinkers in the unradical world of American classical music,” Vijay leads a protean career as a thought leader, performer, collaborator and communicator.
He has performed as an international recitalist, soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral musician for over 20 years, playing his solo debut with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Zubin Mehta. A member of the first violin section of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 12 years, Vijay has collaborated with the Kronos Quartet, the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, Yo-Yo Ma, and he appears regularly with the Strings Festival in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. He served as a member of the first violin section of the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 12 years.
A dynamic recording artist, Vijay recently released Breathe, an album of the piano chamber music of Reena Esmail, under his own label. His solo violin album When the Violin, a solo violin album featuring the music of Esmail, J. S. Bach, and Esa-Pekka Salonen will be available on Bandcamp in June 2021. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Marist College, and a Master’s in Music from the Yale School of Music.