Stephen Spottswood, native of Silver Spring, Maryland, moved to Columbus, Ohio to study music education at Capital University. He went on to start his solo career performing as a hip-hop and jazz violinist, while simultaneously working as a middle school orchestra teacher at Reynoldsburg City Schools. Stephen has worked to inspire African-American classically trained musicians to incorporate contemporary genres in their performance. In January of 2020, he founded Columbus Cultural Orchestra whose mission is to advance a collective of multi-generational musicians of color by performing high-quality music. Stephen is married to Jhay Spottswood, and they live in Columbus, Ohio.