Blake Yarbrough began his horn studies at the age of 11 in Richardson, TX, a suburb of Dallas.  He received his Bachelor of Music in Horn Performance at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois and a Master of Music in Horn Performance at the College-Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, Ohio.  His primary teachers include Randy Gardner, Gail Williams, Bill Barnewitz, Franz Söllner, and Gregory Hustis.

 

Yarbrough is currently employed by the United States Navy and is a member of the U.S. Navy Band Northwest at Naval Base Kitsap - Bangor located in Silverdale, WA.  Previously, he was a member of the U.S. Fleet Forces Band located in Norfolk, VA.  Yarbrough was a soloist with the U.S. Fleet Forces Band and U.S. Navy Band Northwest on 3 occasions in 2013 and 2014.  He is also an active free-lance musician in the Seattle area having performed with the Federal Way Symphony and Yakima Symphony Orchestras. Before joining the U.S. Navy, he was a free-lancer in the Dallas area, where he performed with Legacy Brass, Meridian Chamber Players, and the Red River Horn Quartet.  He has performed around the world in Canada, Austria, Czech Republic, Germany, Romania, and Moscow and has performed under the batons of Andrew Litton, Hugh Wolff, and Paavo Järvi, to name a few.  

 

Private teaching has been one of the primary aspects of Yarbrough’s career.  He started teaching in high school and continued to teach while in Chicago, Cincinnati, and Dallas where he had a studio of sixty students ranging from beginner through college level.  Yarbrough was also on the faculty of the Abilene Summer Music Festival and was an adjunct French horn instructor at Brookhaven College in 2011.  He currently teaches students in the Seattle area.

 

In addition to performing the horn, Yarbrough is a software engineer at Microsoft and volunteers with nonprofits. He helped establish the Poulsbo Community Orchestra in March 2014 where he held every position at some point and left the board of directors in September 2022. The orchestra is continuing to grow attracting local musicians to provide classical music for Poulsbo. He is currently President of the Roxy Bremerton Foundation Board of Directors, where he has served as a director since 2019.

 

Blake Yarbrough resides in Bremerton, WA with his beautiful wife, Jennifer, who is a very successful violinist, and their dogs, Daisy and Gatsby.  He enjoys cooking and spending time outdoors.