Yo-Yo Ma’s multi-faceted career is testament to his belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works for cello, bringing us together to explore culture’s role in society, or engaging unexpected musical forms, Yo-Yo seeks to foster connections that reinforce our humanity.
In concert with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Ricardo Muti
All the things I love about life outside music have to do with people, and playing the cello allows me to fulfill all those interests through music.
Yo-Yo and his creative team at Sound Postings collaborate with partners around the globe to develop and produce initiatives that advocate for a world guided by humanity, curiosity, and connection. Their recent projects include a six-continent tour of Bach’s cello suites exploring how culture strengthens communities today, and Our Common Nature, a journey celebrating the ways that culture can reconnect us to the natural world. Both endeavors reflect Yo-Yo’s lifelong commitment to stretching the boundaries of genre and tradition to ask how music can help us imagine and build a better future.
In Mumbai, 2019
At the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, Athens, 2019
Yo-Yo was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris. He began to learn cello with his father at age four and three years later moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his studies at The Juilliard School before pursuing a liberal arts education at Harvard.
In the Kalahari Desert, 1993
With the Silkroad Ensemble at the United Nations Headquarters, 2008
As musicians, we transcend technique in order to seek out the truths in our world in a way that gives meaning and sustenance to individuals and communities. That’s art for life’s sake.
He has received numerous awards, including the Avery Fisher Prize (1978), the National Medal of the Arts (2001), the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2010), Kennedy Center Honors (2011), the Polar Music Prize (2012), and the Birgit Nilsson Prize (2022). Among other roles, Yo-Yo is a United Nations Messenger of Peace, a member of the board of Nia Tero, an organization supporting the role and influence of Indigenous Peoples, and the founder of the global music collective Silkroad. He has performed for ten American presidents.
Working with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and its Negaunee Music Institute
In Guangzhou with Youth Music Culture Guangdong, 2020
His discography of more than 120 albums (including 20 Grammy winners) ranges from iconic interpretations of the Western classical canon to recordings that defy categorization, such as “Hush” with Bobby McFerrin and the “Goat Rodeo Sessions” with Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer, and Chris Thile. Yo-Yo’s recent releases include “Six Evolutions,” his third recording of Bach’s cello suites; “Merci” with pianist Kathryn Stott; and “Beethoven for Three: Symphony No. 3 ‘Eroica’ and Leonore Overture No. 3,” the fifth in a series of Beethoven recordings with pianist Emanuel Ax and violinist Leonidas Kavakos.
With Fred Rogers, 1985
The Goat Rodeo Sessions with Edgar Meyer, Chris Thile, and Stuart Duncan
Yo-Yo and his wife have two children. He plays the 1712 Davidoff Stradivarius, a 1733 Montagnana from Venice, and modern instruments made by Peter and Wendy Moes.
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Songs of Comfort and Hope, 2020
With Emanuel Ax, 2016
Culture is the foundation on which we will imagine and build a world in which we reaffirm our commitment to equality and safety for all, we act with empathy, and we know that we can always do better.
At the Trent School, 1962
At the United Nations Headquarters, 2006
