Lev Roshal is an American Violinist/Music Theorist. He holds Bachelors degrees in Violin and Music Theory from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied under Mikhail Kopelman, a Bachelors degree in Mathematics from the University of Rochester, and Masters degrees in Violin and Music Theory from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where he studied under Austin Hartman. Lev is currently working on dual doctorate degrees in Violin (DM) and Music Theory (PhD) at IU Jacobs.
Lev is the concertmaster of the Ohio Light Opera (a position he has held since 2024 following two years as assistant concertmaster), and holds a section violin position with the Carmel (Indiana) Symphony Orchestra. He also serves as the elected president of the Indiana University Graduate Theory Association, a position whose responsibilities include the organizing of the annual Symposium of Research in Music, now in its 31st year.
When not performing or writing about music, Lev enjoys a good board or soccer game, and is an avid hiker and orienteerer.
Lev first picked up the violin at the age of four, when he began his studies at the Hochstein School of Music in Rochester, NY, and later expanded his musical interests to include theory when he took his first theory lessons at the age of 10 in Seattle, WA. In Seattle, he continued his violin studies under Marjorie Kransberg-Talvi, the then concertmaster of the Pacific Northwest Ballet. He later attended the Mannes School of Music's Pre-College program, where he earned honors in violin performance under Lewis Kaplan as well as in music composition under Eleanor Cory. While at Mannes, he made his orchestral solo debut with the Ars Viva Symphony Orchestra, performing Mozart's Fourth Violin Concerto, as well as his Carnegie Hall solo debut.
During his time at the Eastman School of Music, he pursued a dual degree triple-major program with the University of Rochester and served as concertmaster of the Empire Film and Media Ensemble. As a member of the Eastman Philharmonia, he can be heard on the album Jeff Beal: The Paper Lined Shack (2022 - Supertrain Records), under the direction of Leonard Slatkin and featuring soprano Hila Plitmann. Within the five years he was at Eastman and the University of Rochester, he also applied his studies of mathematics - working summers as a data analyst at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC. His contributions there were rewarded with authorship on three separate papers. He graduated in 2020, receiving his degrees Magna Cum Laude with distinction.
During his studies at IU, where he has been since the Fall of 2020, he has served in various principal roles throughout the IU orchestras, and has successfully won positions with the Ohio Light Opera (Concertmaster) and the Carmel Symphony Orchestra (Section 1st Violin). His first non-orchestral album, Sergei Bortkiewicz: Complete Works for Violin and Piano, recorded in New York City with brilliant pianist Albert Newberry while both studied at IU is available for purchase and streaming on all major platforms. He has also held multiple elected positions in IU's Graduate Theory Association, including that of the 2024-2025 president. In these roles, he helped organize the 28th - 31st annual Music Research Symposiums held at IU during the Spring. He has been honored to have served as a coordinating instructor (instructor of record) of various theory courses over the past several years, and has presented at multiple theory colloquiums and at the Rocky Mountains Music Scholars Conference.