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Yo-Yo Ma (born October 7, 1955) is a French and American cellist.
He was a child prodigy and was performing by age five.
He completed a Bachelor's degree from Harvard University in 1976.
He has played as a soloist with many major orchestras.
His 75 albums have received fifteen Grammy Awards.In addition to recordings of the standard Classical repertoire, he has recorded American bluegrass music; traditional Chinese melodies; the tangos of Argentinian composer Ástor Piazzolla; Brazilian music; and a collaboration with Bobby McFerrin.Ma's primary performance instrument is a Montagnana cello built in 1733 valued at US$2.5 million.He was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 2001, Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011, and the Polar Music Prize in 2012.Early life and studiesYo-Yo Ma was born in Paris on October 7, 1955, to Chinese parents, and had a musical upbringing.
His mother, Marina Lu, was a singer, and his father, Hiao-Tsiun Ma, was a violinist and professor of music at Nanjing National Central University (predecessor of the present-day Nanjing University).
The family moved to New York when he was five years old.At a young age, Ma began studying violin, and later viola, before settling on the cello in 1960 at age four.
According to Yo-Yo Ma, his first choice was the double bass due to its large size, but he compromised and took up cello instead.
The child prodigy began performing before audiences at age five, and performed for Presidents Dwight D.
Eisenhower and John F.
Kennedy when he was seven.
At age eight, he appeared on American television with his sister, Yeou-Cheng Ma, in a concert conducted by Leonard Bernstein.
Ma attended Trinity School in New York but transferred to the Professional Children's School, from which he graduated at fifteen years of age.
He appeared as a soloist with the Harvard Radcliffe Orchestra in a performance of the Tchaikovsky Rococo Variations.Ma studied at the Juilliard School at age nineteen with Leonard Rose and attended Columbia University but dropped out.
He enrolled at Harvard University later on.
Prior to entering Harvard, Ma played in the Marlboro Festival Orchestra under the direction of nonagenarian cellist and conductor Pablo Casals.
Ma would ultimately spend four summers at the Marlboro Music Festival after meeting and falling in love with Mount Holyoke College sophomore and festival administrator Jill Hornor his first summer there in 1972.However, even before that time, Ma had steadily gained fame and had performed with many of the world's major orchestras.
His recordings and performances of Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Suites recorded in 1983 and again in 1994–1997 are particularly acclaimed.
He has also played chamber music, often with the pianist Emanuel Ax, with whom he has a close friendship back from their days together at the Juilliard School of Music in New York.Ma received his bachelor's degree from Harvard in 1976.
In 1991, he received an honorary doctorate from Harvard.CareerIn 1997 he was featured on John Williams' soundtrack to the Hollywood film, Seven Years in Tibet.
In 2000, he was heard on the soundtrack of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and in 2003 on that of Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World.
He collaborated with Williams again on the original score for the 2005 film Memoirs of a Geisha.
Yo-Yo Ma has also worked with Italian composer Ennio Morricone and has recorded Morricone's compositions of the Dollars Trilogy including The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in America, The Mission and The Untouchables.
He also has over 75 albums, 15 of which are Grammy Award winners.
Ma is a recipient of the International Center in New York's Award of Excellence.Ma was named Peace Ambassador by UN then Secretary-General Kofi Annan in January 2006.On November 3, 2009, President Obama appointed Ma to serve on the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities.
His music was featured in the 2010 documentary Jews and Baseball: An American Love Story, narrated by Academy Award winner Dustin Hoffman.In 2010, Ma was named Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
In partnership with the orchestra's music director, Riccardo Muti, Ma launched the Citizen Musician initiative.Ma currently plays with his own Silk Road Ensemble, which has the goal of bringing together musicians from diverse countries all of which are historically linked via the Silk Road, and records on the Sony Classical label.
He also founded the Silk Road Connect, which involved children from middle schools such as JHS 185 in Queens, New York.Playing styleMa has been referred to as "omnivorous" by critics, and possesses an eclectic repertoire.
A sampling of his versatility in addition to numerous recordings of the standard classical repertoire would include his recordings of Baroque pieces using period instruments; American bluegrass music; traditional Chinese melodies including the soundtrack to the film Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon; the tangos of Argentinian composer Ástor Piazzolla; Brazilian Music, in recording traditional songs and songs composed by Antonio Carlos Jobim and Pixinguinha.
A collaboration with Bobby McFerrin (where Ma admitted to being terrified of the improvisation McFerrin pushed him toward); as well as the music of modern minimalist Philip Glass in such works as the 2002 piece Naqoyqatsi.He is known for his smooth, rich tone as well as his virtuosity, including a cello recording of Niccolò Paganini's 24th Caprice for solo violin, and Zoltán Kodály's solo sonata.InstrumentsMa's primary performance instrument is the cello nicknamed Petunia, built by Domenico Montagnana in 1733.
It was named this by a female student who approached him after one of his classes in Salt Lake City asking if he had a nickname for his cello.
He said, "No, but if I play for you, will you name it?" She chose Petunia, and it stuck.
This cello, more than 280 years old and valued at US$2.5 million, was lost in the fall of 1999 when Ma accidentally left the instrument in a taxicab in New York City.
It was later recovered undamaged.Another of Ma's cellos, the Davidov Stradivarius, was previously owned by Jacqueline du Pré, who passed it to him upon her death.
Though Du Pré previously voiced her frustration with the "unpredictability" of this cello, Yo Yo Ma attributed the comment to du Pré's impassioned style of playing, adding that the Stradivarius cello must be "coaxed" by the player.
It was until recently set up in a Baroque manner, since Ma exclusively played Baroque music on it.
He also owns a modern cello made by Peter and Wendela Moes of Peissenberg, Germany, and one of carbon fiber by the Luis and Clark company of Boston.Notable live performancesOn July 5, 1986, Ma performed on the New York Philharmonic's tribute to the 100th anniversary of the Statue of Liberty, which was televised live on ABC Television.
The orchestra, conducted by Zubin Mehta, performed in Central Park.Ma performed a duet with Condoleezza Rice at the presentation of the 2001 National Medal of Arts and National Humanities Medal Awards.
Ma was the first performer on September 11, 2002, at the site of the World Trade Center, while the first of the names of the dead were read in remembrance on the first anniversary of the attack on the WTC.
He played the Sarabande from Bach's Suite in C minor (#5).
He performed a special arrangement of Sting's "Fragile" with Sting and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir during the opening ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Ma has also appeared as a Pennington Great Performers series artist with the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra in 2005.He performed John Williams' "Air and Simple Gifts" at the inauguration ceremony for Barack Obama on January 20, 2009, along with Itzhak Perlman (violin), Gabriela Montero (piano) and Anthony McGill (clarinet).
While the quartet did play live, the music played simultaneously over speakers and on television a recording was made two days prior due to concerns over the cold weather damaging the instruments.
Ma was quoted as saying "A broken string was not an option.
It was wicked cold."On May 3, 2009, Ma performed the world premiere of Bruce Adolphe's "Self Comes to Mind" for solo cello and two percussionists with John Ferrari and Ayano Kataoka at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.
The work is based on a poetic description written for the composer of the evolution of brain into mind by neuroscientist Antonio Damasio, and featured, at the premiere, a film of brain scans provided by Hanna Damasio plus other images, coordinated with the music during the performance.On August 29, 2009, Ma performed at the funeral mass for Senator Edward M.
Kennedy.
Pieces he performed included the Sarabande movement from Bach's Cello Suite No.
6, and Franck's Panis Angelicus with Plácido Domingo.On October 3, 2009, Ma appeared alongside Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper at the National Arts Centre gala in Ottawa.
Harper, a fan of The Beatles, played the piano and sang a rendition of "With A Little Help From My Friends" while Ma accompanied him on his cello.On October 16, 2011, Ma performed at the memorial for Steve Jobs held in Stanford University's Memorial Church.In 2011, Ma performed with American dancer Charles "Lil Buck" Riley in the United States and in China at the U.S.-China Forum on the Arts and Culture.On April 18, 2013, Ma performed at an interfaith service to honor the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings, held at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.
He played the Sarabande from Bach's Cello Suite No.
5 in C minor.
Also, he and other musicians accompanied members of the Boston Children's Chorus in a hymn.Media appearancesMa has appeared in an episode of the animated children's television series, Arthur, as well as on The West Wing (episode "Noël", in which he performed the prelude to the Bach Cello Suite No.1 at a Congressional Christmas party), Sesame Street and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
In The Simpsons episode "Missionary: Impossible", Ma, (voiced by Hank Azaria) runs after Homer Simpson along with many other frequent guests of PBS.He also starred in the visual accompaniment to his recordings of Bach's Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello.Ma was often invited to press events by Apple Inc.
and Pixar CEO Steve Jobs, and has performed on stage during event keynote presentations, as well as appearing in a commercial for the Macintosh computer.
Ma's Bach recordings were used in a memorial video released by Apple on the first anniversary of Jobs' death.Ma was a guest on the Not My Job segment of Wait Wait...
Don't Tell Me! on April 7, 2007, where he won for listener Thad Moore.On October 27, 2008, Ma appeared as a guest and performer on The Colbert Report.
He was also a show's guest on November 1, 2011, where he performed songs from The Goat Rodeo Sessions with fellow musicians Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer and Chris Thile.Name and genealogyAccording to research done by Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
for the PBS series Faces of America, a relative had hidden the Ma family genealogy in his home in China to save it from destruction during the Cultural Revolution.
Ma's paternal ancestry can be traced back eighteen generations to the year 1217.
This genealogy had been compiled in the 18th century by an ancestor, tracing everyone with the surname Ma, through the paternal line, back to one common ancestor in the 3rd century BC.
Ma's generation name, "Yo", had been decided by his fourth great grand-uncle, Ma Ji Cang, in 1755.Personal lifeMa married his long-time girlfriend Jill Hornor, a German language instructor, in 1978.
He proposed outside her apartment.
They have two children, Nicholas and Emily, and reside in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Ma's elder sister, Yeou-Cheng Ma, who was also born in Paris, is a violinist married to Michael Dadap, a New York–based guitarist from the Philippines.