Valerie Little

Pennsylvania native Valerie Little became a tenured member of the Minnesota Orchestra in September 2015 after serving six seasons as acting assistant principal librarian. When she's not in the library, she enjoys serving on various orchestra committees and hosting pre-concert talks.

Also an accomplished violist, Little has often performed with the Minnesota Orchestra, Minnesota Opera, Mill City Summer Opera, Orchestra Iowa, Florestan Chamber Music and on the Schubert Club’s Courtroom Concerts series. She is an artist in residence at the annual Apollo Music Festival in Houston, Minnesota, where she also serves as librarian. For nine seasons, she was the violist for Mill City String Quartet. She is also a seven-time MPR Class Notes Artist, and a past teaching artist for Schubert Club, Chamber Music Society of St. Cloud and Britt Festival in Jacksonville, Oregon. Recently, Little co-founded Ninebark Ensemble, a mixed chamber ensemble with a string trio at its core.

Little holds bachelor’s degrees in viola performance and English from Penn State University, a master of music degree in viola performance from the University of Texas-Austin, and a doctor of musical arts degree in viola performance from the University of Minnesota.

Little studied creative writing at Penn State and the University of Pennsylvania. Two of her non-fiction pieces were nominated for a 2020 Pushcart Prize. In 2022, her debut chapbook, Little Blue Primer, was one of seven finalists for the 16th Annual National Indie Excellence Award for Poetry.