Students each year
Education programs reach as many as 20,000 students annually across New Jersey.
We are the musicians of New Jersey.
Sixty-six professional artists. One statewide orchestra. A living cultural resource worth protecting — for every stage, classroom and community we serve.
01 / Where we play
Five cities. One orchestra.
We are New Jersey’s orchestra in the fullest sense: more than 55 mainstage concerts a year across five cities, plus schools and public spaces statewide. Every one of these stages matters to the community around it. Concert nights fill the restaurants and shops around every hall — each stage is an economic engine for its downtown.
- NewarkNew Jersey Performing Arts Center
- New BrunswickState Theatre New Jersey
- MorristownMayo Performing Arts Center
- PrincetonRichardson Auditorium
- Red BankCount Basie Center for the Arts
55+mainstage concerts a year
20,000students reached annually
21counties with music in schools and neighborhoods
5cities with a home stage
Growing, not retreating. The planned Symphony Center in Jersey City’s Powerhouse Arts District adds a permanent headquarters and a 550-seat hall in 2027 — while mainstage concerts continue at NJPAC and music education continues in Newark, Essex County, and statewide. A stronger orchestra belongs deeply to more than one city.
02 / Who we are
Artists. Teachers. Neighbors.
We are the 66 full-time union musicians of the New Jersey Symphony — the largest single employer of union musicians in the state. We are proud members of AFM Local 16-248, and we speak collectively through our elected Orchestra Committee.
1922founded — centennial celebrated in 2022, now playing toward the next hundred years
66full-time musicians with salary and benefits
2015Xian Zhang appointed Music Director — the first woman in the role
2025Joshua Bell begins as Principal Guest Conductor
“A vital, artistically significant musical organization.”— The Wall Street Journal, quoted by New Jersey Symphony
By the numbers
Music is not just entertainment. In hospitals across New Jersey, our music helps ease pain, anxiety, and fatigue, and helps patients heal.
140,000
New Jerseyans reached
Every year through concerts, education and community programs.
160+
Events each year
Concerts, education and community events across the state.
60,000
Education participants
In education and community engagement offerings each year.
200+
Community performances
Musician-led chamber programs reaching 25,000+ attendees in a single season.
301
Youth Orchestra students
From 11 counties, across eight ensembles.
10
Years of Music and Wellness
Bedside serenades and chamber concerts that help ease pain, anxiety, and fatigue for patients in hospitals, nursing homes, rehab centers, and hospices. Learn more.
Thousands
Patients, families, and caregivers reached
Music that promotes healing and quality of life, through the Hackensack Meridian Health partnership, extended for 5 more years in 2024. Read more.
03 / Community Partners
A statewide stage. A lifelong invitation.
NJS musicians coach the next generation: the New Jersey Symphony Youth Orchestras run four ensembles, from the Training Ensemble to the Academy Orchestra, alongside coaching in schools across the state.
Years of youth orchestras
Four ensembles, from the Training Ensemble to the Academy Orchestra, have built a nearly 35-year pipeline of young musicians across northern and central New Jersey.
Music in school
New Jersey Symphony musicians serve as coaches in residence in schools, bringing sustained, hands-on music instruction directly into classrooms across the state.
Music near you
NJS musicians design and perform chamber programs that bring the orchestra into communities.
04 / The work
The musicians are the mission.
We are not a line item apart from the orchestra. We are the people who make the orchestra sound.
World-class performance takes a working life. Rehearsals and concerts are only the visible portion: preparation, practice, instrument care, teaching, travel and community work happen around them.
New Jersey’s 66 salaried, benefited orchestra positions are a rare professional infrastructure for artists in this state. For the state and the companies that invest in it, that means full concert halls, music education across New Jersey, and a cultural institution the whole state can claim.
05 / Meet the musicians
The people behind the sound.
Onstage, in classrooms and across the state, every performance is shaped by individual artists with their own stories. Hover a portrait for a name — click for the musician’s instrument and chair.
68 musicians
06 / Stand with us
Keep a world-class orchestra in New Jersey.
Show up. Fill the halls in Newark and across the state. Bring someone who has never heard the orchestra live. Find tickets
Speak up. Tell civic leaders, funders and neighbors why professional music belongs in New Jersey.
Share the facts. Sixty-six careers, five major venues and as many as 20,000 students a year are a public asset worth sustaining.
Chip in. Ticket sales fill our halls, but donations sustain the institution. Make a gift to the NJ Symphony · Official site
Thank you for your support.
07 / Keep in touch
We would love to hear from you.
Questions, ideas, or words of support. Send us a note using the form. Messages go straight to the musicians behind this site, and we read every one.
Coming to a concert soon? Tell us which hall. Want to help spread the word? Tell us where. Just want to say hello? That works too.