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The Icelandic-American cellist, Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir, obtained her Bachelor of Music degree in Cello Performance from Cleveland Institute of Music, where her principal teacher (Ellis A. Feiman Memorial Award in Cello and the Bennett Levine Memorial Award in Chamber Music); her Master of Music degree in Cello Performance from The Juilliard School, where her principal teacher was Joel Krosnick; and her DMA degree in Cello Performance from State University of New York at Stony Brook (2011-2015). She has garnered numerous prizes in international competitions, including the Naumburg Competition in New York and the Antonio Janigro Competition in Zagreb, Croatia. She is an alum of Ensemble Connect - a program of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School, and the Weill Music Institute in partnership with the New York City Department of Education - performing chamber music at Carnegie Hall and bringing classical music to students in the New York City Public Schools. Starting in the fall of 2013, she has been Artist-in-Residence at Sonoma State University´s Green Music Center in California.
Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir enjoys a varied career as a performer, collaborator and artist teacher. She has appeared as soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Symphony Orchestra, among others, and her recital and chamber music performances have taken her across the USA, Europe and Asia. Sæunn has performed in many of the world’s prestigious venues including Carnegie Hall, Suntory Hall, Elbphilharmonie, Barbican Center and Disney Hall and the Los Angeles Times praised her performances for their “emotional intensity”.
Her most recent recording, "Marrow: The 6 Suites for Solo Cello by J.S. Bach", was released in June 2023 and has already garnered international attention, the The Arts Desk (UK) noting “Thorsteinsdóttir’s poised, lyrical playing makes this set a front runner among recent recordings”. Other recent releases on the Sono Luminus label include "Vernacular", a solo album of Icelandic music for cello, and the award-winning cello concerto, Quake, written for her by Páll Ragnar Pálsson, with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, which was nominated for a 2021 Grammy.
In 2022, Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir premiered Gemæltan, a new concerto by Canadian/Icelandic composer, Veronique Vaka, with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra as part of her role as Artist-in-Residence of the 2022-2023 season, as well as performing chamber music and solo recitals in New York, Los Angeles, Reykjavík, San Francisco, Seattle, and Singapore.
In addition to collaborating with Daníel Bjarnason on his award-winning composition Bow to String, Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir enjoys working with composers of our time such as Valerie Coleman, Reza Vali, Þuríður Jónsdóttir, Halldór Smárason, Jane Antonia Cornish and Melia Watras. She has also given the world premiere of Anna Thorvaldsdóttir’s cadenza for Haydn’s D Major concerto that she wrote for Sæunn, as well as the USa premiere of Betsy Jolas’ Wanderlied and the Hong Kong premiere of Sofia Gubaidulina's Canticle of the Sun, for cello, 2 percussionists and choir.
An avid chamber musician, Sofia Gubaidulina has collaborated in performance with Itzhak Perlman, Mitsuko Uchida, Richard Goode and members of the Emerson, Guarneri and Cavani Quartets and has participated in numerous chamber music festivals, including Prussia Cove and Marlboro, with whom she has toured. Formerly Artist-in-Residence at Green Music Center’s Weill Hall in Sonoma as well as cellist of the Manhattan Piano Trio (August 2013-June 2016), she is currently cellist and founding member of Decoda (since April 2012), The Affiliate Ensemble of Carnegie Hall.
Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir has served as Artist in Residence (September 2015-Septembrt 2018) and Associate Professor (since August 2018) at University of Washington - School of Music. She currently serves on the faculty of the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (since August 2022). |
