Biography

 Award-winning American cellist Katie Tertell is a performer and artistic curator, innovating how classical music is digested in modern times.  Katie is Artistic Director and Founder of the Appalachian Chamber Music Festival, headquartered in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, USA. She is also a member of the critically-acclaimed folk band Howay the Lasses as well as female-led chamber collective Musici Ireland and duo, Cello Power. Formerly a Tutti cellist of the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, she enjoys a rich and varied experience as an artist in Europe and America.  
 

Alongside work with internationally-recognized ensembles, Katie focuses her attention on projects that aim to connect people through meaningful experiences in music, working cross disciplinarily and in various sectors.  Notable projects include the “Lost in Plain Sight” project (exploring the life and legacy of Gaspar Cassadó), featured on NPR’s Morning Edition in 2023, “Cello Power: The Popper Project” featured in The Strad in 2022, and project development on a multi-disciplinary work about unseen disabilities to be premiered internationally in 2025.

 

Katie also performs and records regularly with celebrated European symphony and chamber orchestras including in various leadership roles at major venues and festivals like the Barbican and Southbank Centre in London, BBC Proms and the National Concert Hall of Ireland.  She can be heard regularly on BBC Radio 3 and RTÈ Lyric FM in recorded and live performances of both chamber and orchestral works.  Katie teaches cello at Durham University (UK).  

 

Katie grew up outside of Washington D.C. in McLean, Virginia. She holds degrees with honors in performance from Indiana University, Cleveland Institute of Music and the Royal Northern College of Music, as well as a Second Masters degree in Suzuki Pedagogy from the Sato Center at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Her teachers and mentors include among many Janos Starker, Emilio Colón, Joely Koos, Peter Dixon and Ralph Kirschbaum. She plays on an 1888 Colin-Mezin cello.