Star cellist, Joshua Roman, performs with LSO Friday

Seattle Symphony Orchestra conductor Gerard Schwartz knew what his first chair cellist, Joshua Roman, had in mind.

As they were chatting backstage one evening, Schwartz said, “You want to start a solo career and leave the orchestra, don’t you?”

Roman, who had been hired as principal chair cello at the ripe old age of 22, told him he thought that he was ready to go out on his own.

“I always had my sights on a solo career, and it was obvious to him that it would come to this,” Roman said.

Roman will solo with the Lansing Symphony on Friday on the Elgar & Rachmaninoff Masterworks 2 concert.

Holding a coveted principal cello chair for a major symphony orchestra at such a young age is a prestigious listing on a musician’s resume, but Roman had a secret that he hadn’t fully explained to Schwartz.

“I’ve wanted to have a solo cello career since I was 6 years old. I didn’t really know what it meant back then, but I wanted it anyway. I thought it would be something like a rock star traveling around. Believe me, I’ve found that it’s not like that.”

Roman’s parents are both church musicians in his native Oklahoma City. When Josh was 3 years old, they bought him a quarter-size cello.

“It’s hard to recall that far back,” said Roman, “but I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love the cello.”

His teacher, surprisingly, was a violinist – not a cellist - with the Oklahoma Symphony and had to learn a lot about position and technique on the cello. But he knew all about tone production and musicality, which Roman gobbled up over ten years of instruction.

Roman says “the public schools didn’t have much for me, but I played at house concerts and with all kinds of different musicians – which introduced me to a tapestry of different styles.

“My parents were supportive of my playing, but a bit wary of my ambitions.”

Roman attended the Cleveland Institute of Music for his formal musical training for a bachelor’s and master’s in cello performance – and then off to Seattle.

He planned to stay for four years, maybe more, but things started changing. “Opportunities were there. I felt that this was my window of time.”

In addition to solo concerts, Roman was also going to add chamber music to his life scheme, but that didn’t work. “I love melody too much”, he said. “In a string quartet the first violinist has most of melody, and the rest of the instruments don’t have that much melody to add.”

Moving from an orchestra cellist gig to a traveling soloist is almost like a career change. “It’s been much different that I thought it would be - a lot more challenging.”

One thing Roman has found is that there is not that much solo literature for him to play with orchestras other than the Elgar and Dvorak cello concertos and a handful of others. So he is working at expanding the repertoire.

Pulitzer Prize winning composer Aaron Jay Kernis wrote a cello concerto for him, and Roman has taken to composing himself, and is now writing his second concerto.

“I’m also collaborating with other composers and artists. I don’t have time to be a dedicated teacher, but I love doing master classes (He’ll be doing one at MSU while he’s here), it sharpens my own self assessment.”

The young cellist will be performing one on the great romantic cello masterpieces with the Lansing Symphony Orchestra, the Elgar Cello Concerto, which is synonymous with Jacqueline DuPre who died young from Multiple Sclerosis.

Roman says, “She was incredible. She owned that piece even before she became famous. And then the whole romance with her and Daniel Barenboim added to the story.”

Even though he’s played the Elgar many times, he works hard at being “brutally honest” when interpreting the music. “Even though I’ve heard many interpretation of the concerto, I have to get to know the music through getting into the score. I always want to find something new.”

IF YOU GO

What: MasterWorks 2 – Elgar and Rachmaninoff, Lansing Symphony Orchestra, Timothy Muffitt, Conductor and Music Director, Joshua Roman, Cello soloist, Elgar, Cello Concerto. Rachmaninoff, Symphony No. 2

When: 8 p.m., Friday Oct. 9

Where: Wharton Center for Performing Arts, East Lansing

Tickets: $20-50. Call (517) 487-5001 or lansingsymphony.org