| Birth Date: | 15 January 1948 |
| Birth Place: | Neptune Township, New Jersey |
| Instrument: | French horn |
| Genre: | Classical |
| Associated Acts: | Los Angeles Philharmonic |
Robert Lee Watt (born January 15, 1948) is an American horn player and the first African-American French hornist hired by a major symphony orchestra in the United States.[1] [2]
Born in Neptune Township, New Jersey, his father was a jazz trumpet player who did not approve of his choice of instrument—feeling Watt's background and race would make a career with the horn impossible.[3] Nevertheless, Watt won a scholarship to the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and continued studies at California Institute of the Arts.
In 1970 at the age of twenty-two he was hired by Zubin Mehta and the Los Angeles Philharmonic to play assistant principal horn where he remained for 37 years before retiring in 2008.[1]