Kristin Sande began studying the violin at the age of five. The Duluth music education community was integral to her upbringing. She is proud to work alongside many of her childhood teachers as colleagues and peers in a variety of musical organizations in the area, including the Duluth Superior Symphony Orchestra (DSSO).
“I love that I get to devote my time to a cause I am so passionate about and to a community that helped raise me. Four of our principal string players were my music teachers growing up. (Laurie Bastian and Erin Aldridge were my violin teachers; Kevin Hoeschen was my Youth Symphony conductor, and Betsy Husby was my brother’s cello teacher and my professor at UMD,” she said.
Sande holds a Bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance from the University of Minnesota Duluth, where she studied with Jean “Rudy” Perrault.
Making Duluth Her Permanent Home
When she was five, Sande’s family moved to Duluth from Rochester, Minnesota, after her father, having completed his residency at Mayo, was hired at St. Mary’s/Duluth Clinic (now Essentia).
Her mother is the Music Director at First Lutheran Church, plays and teaches the organ and piano, and directs the handbell choir.
“I grew up in a family that put a lot of emphasis on education and academic achievement. I felt a lot of pressure, spoken and unspoken, to decide on a career path, go off to college, and move to a larger city—somewhere ‘bigger and better,’ “she explained.
“It took me a while to realize that I actually did want to stay in Duluth. Staying here, and being a force for good in this community, feels much more meaningful to me than going elsewhere,” she added.
“I don’t think I would be happy waking up every morning and not seeing Lake Superior on my way to work. I love to travel, but I haven’t found an equivalent feeling anywhere else. To me, the lake is a reminder that I am a tiny, yet intrinsic, part of nature and the entire universe . . .”
“I love the community and life I’ve built here. Something I find fascinating about Duluth is that it’s not a terribly famous or renowned place—yet there’s something that draws people here and makes them want to stay. If they do leave, they keep coming back.”
A Musical Life
Kristin is a member of the violin sections of the Duluth Superior Symphony Orchestra and the Lake Superior Chamber Orchestra. She also maintains a small studio of violin and viola students.
“I regularly play gigs and do freelance library work for the Lake Superior Chamber Orchestra, Borealis Chamber Artists, LOON, FinnFest, and more. I’m a member of the Canal String Quartet and am passionate about chamber music,” she explained.
Her main gig, however, is working as the music librarian for the DSSO and as DSSYO(Duluth Superior Youth Orchestra) Administrative Assistant. She was hired in November 2018 after a friend sent her the DSSO’s job posting for a part-time librarian.
Essentially, she is responsible for all the sheet music that the orchestra plays. The DSSO owns about 1,000 sets of music. Before each concert, she prepares and distributes all those parts, including erasing old markings and adding new ones, repairing torn pages, numbering and cataloguing to keep track of everything. Sande has gradually taken on additional duties.
In addition to the library work, she also sells tickets in the box office, processes donations, and she serves on the marketing committee.
She chuckles, “Most things that go on here, I’ve had a hand in in some way. We joke that my real job title should be ‘Fixer’ or ‘Other Duties as Assigned.’”
“I love that we are a relatively small regional orchestra with a small staff, she added. “I get to participate in almost everything we do as an organization, so I often witness the direct results of ideas that I helped bring to life. And because I do so many different things here, I am never, ever bored at work.”
She has a chair in the first violin section. ”The thing I love the most about the DSSO is the challenge of playing in the orchestra. The work of learning to play an instrument is never over—you are always discovering new possibilities (and new difficulties). Learning a new piece of music from scratch always seems impossible at the beginning, and at this point in my life, almost everything we play is new to me.”
“Seeing the importance of the DSSO to the artistic community, I think we are one of those cultural threads that help tie the past, present, and future together for people,” she said.
“Going to a concert to hear live music from a hundred or two hundred years ago, programmed alongside music written today, can help us contextualize ourselves within history, and reminds us that we aren’t alone, and never have been,” she concluded.
Information about the DSSO’s Upcoming Concert
French Voyage
Masterworks 4
February 28, 2026 at 7:00 pm
DECC Symphony Hall. 350 Harbor Drive Duluth
From Poulenc’s beautiful Gloria, featuring the DSSO Chorus, to César Frank’s iconic Symphony in D, this night boasts the best of French music.
Tickets online at destinationduluth.co/DSSOMasterworks4
