Dovas Lietuvninkas

New Approaches for New Music

Born in Chicago, Illinois, Dovas Lietuvninkas received degrees in trumpet and music education at the Eastman School of Music where he studied with James Thompson. In 2017 he received a U.S. Fulbright grant to study trumpet and Lithuanian folk instruments in Vilnius, Lithuania, where, in 2018, he joined the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra as principal trumpet. In 2021 he received his master’s degree in trumpet from the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki under Pasi Pirinen and spent a year as a member of the academy of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam.

Dovas returned to the United States in 2023 and is currently principal trumpet of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra. Dovas is a passionate educator and advocate of new music, having commissioned and premiered many new works for trumpet, and is always seeking to cross boundaries and build bridges across all audiences and musics, from folk to the avant-garde.