Jonathan Winkle
Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra Music Director Jonathan Winkle is an accomplished arts administrator, educator, conductor, and trombonist.
Currently the Executive Director of the Sheboygan Symphony Orchestra, he has held positions as Executive & Artistic Director of Performance Santa Fe, President & CEO of the Sharon Lynne Wilson Center for the Arts, and Executive Director for the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra and the Racine Symphony Orchestra. He also served as Vice President of Community Engagement for the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to more than two decades as an arts administrator, he has extensive conducting and trombone performance credits, including currently serving as the Milwaukee Ballet Orchestra’s Assistant and Cover Conductor for the annual Nutcracker productions, and Co-Director of the Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra’s (MYSO) Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Winkle was Music Director of the Carthage College Chamber Orchestra, Music Director of the University of North Texas Brass & Percussion Ensemble, and Founding Artistic Director of Cathedral Brass.
He performed regularly as a substitute/extra musician with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, performed with Present Music for 20 years, and has held tenor trombone and bass trombone positions with numerous orchestras and wind ensembles in Wisconsin, Colorado, Tennessee, and Texas. He was a member of the East Side Jazz Orchestra in Dallas-Fort Worth, Music Director of the Starliner Big Band, and performed regularly with the Albuquerque Jazz Orchestra. Mr. Winkle has also performed for many of the national touring Broadway productions as part of the Marcus Performing Arts Center series over the past 29 years. He currently serves as the local music contractor for Broadway Across America.
Mr. Winkle was the Manager of the Edwards Instrument Co., a division of the Getzen Company, where he participated directly in instrument design, and worked intensively with members of the New York Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Berlin Radio Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and many others.
Mr. Winkle currently serves as the President of the Board of Directors for the Association of Wisconsin Symphony Orchestras (AWSO). Previously, he has served on the board’s of the International Trombone Association, Historic Tennessee Theatre Foundation, Arts Wisconsin, Present Music, Civic Music Association of Milwaukee, and Kenosha Symphony Orchestra.