Jean Marker De Vere

Jean Marker De Vere joined the Minnesota Orchestra in 1978, the same year she graduated from Indiana University, where she was a student of Josef Gingold, and in her junior year received a special distinction – the Performer's Certificate.

Throughout her tenure, De Vere has participated in numerous Minnesota Orchestra activities, most recently in a string quintet during the Orchestra's 2018 Common Chords residency in Mankato. She has also performed on the Orchestra's Kinder Konzert Series and in 2014 with a string quartet of Orchestra musicians as part of the Common Chords residency in Bemidji. 

De Vere grew up in a suburb of Detroit where she began violin studies at age nine in the public school system and later studied with Detroit Symphony member Emily Austin. She was a two-time winner of the American Federation of Musicians Congress of Strings, and has attended several summer music festivals including Blossom Festival, Yale Summer School, Music Academy of the West and the Spoleto Festival.

De Vere is currently on the faculty at both the MacPhail Center for Music and the Mount Calvary Academy of Music. She regularly coaches sectionals for the Minnesota Youth Symphonies and was a member of a string quartet that performed in a 2016 Minnesota state tour featuring Jocelyn Hagen’s opera ‘Test Pilot.’

De Vere has two grown sons: Daniel is working as a computer software developer in Chicago and Brian works in acquisition accounting for the healthcare industry. The De Vere family has traveled through 47 states, including Alaska, in their 24 foot motor home.