Flutist Janet Arms enjoys a notable career as an orchestral musician, soloist, chamber musician, and educator. She has been a member of the New York City Opera orchestra since 1988 and on the faculty of The Hartt School since 1994, where she currently holds the title of Senior Artist Teacher. In 2018 Janet joined the flute faculty at the Cali School of Music, Montclair University as well as the Mannes Prep Division at The New School.
Educated at The Hartt School and The Juilliard School, Ms. Arms was named a prizewinner of the Concert Artists International Competition while completing her Master’s at Juilliard. She was presented in her Carnegie Hall debut the following season, a high profile beginning to an extended, multi-faceted musical journey.
She won her first orchestra position with the Hudson Valley Philharmonic immediately upon graduating from Juilliard. Soon after, she won a position with the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra, winning a position with the NYC Opera a few months later in 1988. After working on both coasts for several years and recording Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker with the SF Ballet, she left San Francisco to make her home in NY full time.
In addition to her work with the NYCO, has performed and recorded with the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Boston, at Tanglewood, and on tour, has been guest principal flutist with the St. Louis Symphony in the US and on a month-long tour throughout Europe, and stepped in as a last minute substitute with the Israel Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall in a concert featuring both Pinchas Zukerman and Itzhak Perlman. Other NY activities have included substitute appearances with the NYC Ballet, the New Jersey Symphony, the American Symphony Orchestra, as well as the broadway shows Finding Neverland, The King and I, and The Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall.
As a soloist, Ms. Arms has made appearances in the States and abroad with the New York Chamber Soloists in a program of Brandenburg Concerti, with the Columbia Valley Festival Orchestra playing Vivaldi’s Piccolo Concerto, in British Columbia performing Mozart’s Flute and Harp Concerto with PRISMA, and with two of Hartt’s performing ensembles for performances of Michael Colgrass’s “A Flute in the Kingdom of Drums and Bells”, and Joel Puckett’s concerto, “The Song of Sirius.”
Her solo recitals include appearances at the Long Island Flute Club, the Hudson Valley Music Club, the Delaware Flute Festival and the Hartt School, where she showcased works by the entire composition faculty in a single evening.
In addition to her solo recitals, Janet has presented a recital featuring chamber music works of Hector Villa Lobos, appeared as a guest with the Concordia Chamber Players, been featured at Lincoln Center playing chamber music of Strauss with musicians of the City Opera, performed with fellow faculty at PRISMA in Powell River, BC, and joined with international faculty in Fortaleza, Brazil for performances of everything from Mozart to Piazzolla.
Some of Ms. Arms recordings include New Heartbeats, a CD featuring the flute repertoire of Robert Carl & Larry Alan Smith, “On the Verge of Remembrance” by Thomas Schuttenhelm recorded by her duo The Pandora Duo with guitarist Christopher Ladd, and she collaborated on composer Richard Wilson’s CD Brash Attacks, performing in his chamber work “Senza Furore”. She has been very active in commercial recording here in NYC, and can be heard on numerous television commercials and on a number of film scores for PBS written and produced by Michael Bacon, including “The Jewish Americans”, “Teddy Roosevelt” and “The Kennedys”.
She had a long standing association with the Bard Festival Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra at Bard, and is on the faculty of PRISMA in Powell River, BC. She has been a guest artist and faculty member at the Festival Eleazar De Carvalho in Fortaleza, Brazil, both teaching and performing, and at St. George International Music Festival.