Kendall, Yumi

She is a cellist born into a musical family, where her brother Nick Kendall is a violinist with the Tim for Three trio, who started to study the cello with the Suzuki method when she was 5 years old, later graduating from the Curtis School of Music.

When she was 16/17 she made her solo debut with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center and in 2004 became Assistant Principal Cello with The Philadelphia Orchestra. 9 years later, in 2013, she was awarded the orchestra’s annual C. Hartman Kuhn Award.

As a chamber and festival musician she has participated in events at the Kingston Music Festival and the Marlboro Music Festival and performed with the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society and the Smithsonian’s 21st-Century Consort. She is a founding member of the Dryden String Quartet.

As a soloist she has given performances with the National Orchestra Institute, the Reading Symphony, Symphony in C and the Williamsburg Sinfonia and as a guest artist she has been Guest Principal Cello with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Hyogo Performing Arts Center in Japan, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.

Recordings she has performed on include Vistas by Ingrid Arauco, Alchemy by Jan Krzywicki and Peter Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 “Pathetique”/Dumka by The Philadelphia Orchestra and Freedom: Danielpour, Wienberg, Finko by Mimi Stillman and Charles Abramovic.

In the field of musical education she has been on the faculties of the Brevard Music Center, the Miami Summer Music Festival, the National Orchestral Institute and the New York State School for Orchestral Studies. She also has her own private teaching studio and has held many master classes. In 2016 she was the founder of the Suzuki Alumni Project and in 2020 became a member of the board of Project 440.

She took further studies at the University of Pennsylvania and graduated in 2017 with a Master of Applied Positive Psychology and from there she has been a speaker at the 2019 inaugural Suzuki Convention of the Americas and guest presented and/or facilitated the consulting firm CRA, Inc and the Board retreat of the Suzuki Association of the Americas. She has also served on the board of the Great Philadelphia Suzuki Association and Astral Artists.

Sources:

Kendall, Yumi

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