Born and raised in Baltimore, violist Sebastian Stefanovic has been a member of the Florida Orchestra since 2022 and resides in Tampa Bay.

A passionate advocate for new music and the expansion of the viola repertoire, he has commissioned, premiered and recorded a variety of solo and ensemble works, including the winning composition of the American Viola Society’s Gardner Prize, as well as participating in the 2020 and 2021 Composers’ Conference.

As a chamber musician, he has received quartet fellowships at the Aspen Music Festival and the Robert Mann String Quartet Seminar. He enjoys inventive and multifaceted programming, frequently curating interdisciplinary collaborations for the Houston-based Kinetic Ensemble, a conductorless string orchestra. He spent three years as a Young Artist for DACAMERA, performing and teaching in schools, museums and galleries across Houston. 

As an educator, he helped found and co-lead a summer program for beginning middle school string players in conjunction with the Florida Orchestra’s education department. In addition to leading orchestral masterclasses and sectionals, he is the music director of the Pinellas Youth Philharmonic.

Sebastian holds a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degreesfrom Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where he was a student of Ivo-Jan van der Werff. When not playing music, he enjoys cooking, reading, soccer and pickleball.