Cello

Arek Tesarczyk

cello

Cellist Arek Tesarczyk joined the Minnesota Orchestra in 2004 and made his solo debut with the Orchestra in 2006, performing Beethoven’s Triple Concerto. He has presented a full range of concerto repertoire, including works by Dvorák, Elgar, Saint-Saëns, Haydn, Schumann, Tchaikovsky and Goldschmidt, as a soloist with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Silesian Chamber Orchestra, Orchesta Sinfonica de Chile and Concert Artists of Baltimore.

Tesarczyk, winner of a 2008 McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians, performs frequently with pianist Claudia Chen, his wife; together they have given recitals in the United States, Canada, Chile and Poland. In 2006 he became a member of the American String Project, a Seattle-based, conductorless ensemble made up of 15 solo string players. In addition, he has performed at chamber music festivals in Europe, the U.S. and Canada, and has appeared at the Kennedy Center and Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., and Merkin Hall in New York. Other performances have taken him to Finland, Switzerland, Germany, England, Scotland and Russia. He has collaborated with such artists as Joseph Silverstein, Pamela Frank, Martin Beaver and Scott St. John, and has recorded Brahms’ G-minor Piano Quartet with Jon Kimura Parker for the Bravo television network.

Born in Poland into a family of musicians, Tesarczyk won three first prizes in the Polish National Cello and Chamber Music competitions before graduating with honors from the Karol Szymanowski School of Music in Katowice. Continuing his studies in the U.S., he worked with the late Stephen Kates at the Peabody Conservatory, where he received the Gregor Piatigorsky Memorial Scholarship and earned two artist diplomas: one in cello performance, the other in chamber music as a member of the Peabody String Quartet. Before joining the Minnesota Orchestra he was principal cello of the Winnipeg Symphony for 11 years.