Cellist, Courtenay Vandiver has been praised for her “wonderful technique and creamy sound,” New Jersey Star Ledger and called an “expert player”, The Boston Globe. Ms. Vandiver has performed with the St. Petersburg and Jupiter String Quartets, The Young Eight, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Boston Lyric Opera, Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, and Fifth Tier New Music Ensemble. Ms. Vandiver was awarded the Yellow Rose of Texas by former governor Ann Richards for outstanding artistic achievement. A devoted teacher, she maintains a private studio in Milton, MA. In addition, she has served on the faculties of Yellow Barn’s Young Artist Program, Rocky Mountain Summer Conservatory and Blue Lake Fine Art’s Camp. She also enjoys coaching for the Greater Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra. At the 2007 Texas Music Educators Association, she demonstrated in the clinic, “Fun in Thumb Postion”.
She has participated in the Steans Institute for Young Artists at Ravinia, Sarasota Music Festival, New York String Orchestra Seminar, International Summer Music Festival (Leipzig, Germany), Bach Festival, Lyricafest, and Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival taking part in the European tour, under the direction of Heinrich Schiff. As a two-year participant at Yellow Barn, she collaborated with Donald Weilerstein, Roger Tapping, Kathie Murdock, Susan Narucki, Natasha Brofsky, Violaine Melancon, and Bonnie Hampton.
Courtenay received her Bachelor of Music at the New England Conservatory studying with Laurence Lesser. She received her Master of Music degree at the same institution with Paul Katz, graduating with Academic and Artistic Distinction in both degrees. While at NEC she was a founding member of the award-winning Honors Brando String Quartet and served as John Heiss’ cellist for the Contemporary Ensemble over the course of six years. As winner of the Commencement Competition, she performed Tchaikovsky’s Pezzo Capriccioso with orchestra in Jordan Hall.
Ms. Vandiver is interested in a wide variety of music. In the fall, she toured with Jethro Tull on a portion of their world-wide tour spanning 22 US cities. She also performed with the American Repertory Theater in its production of Melancholy, scored for solo cello. Recently she recorded for What Time Is It, Mr. Fox?, a gothic/acoustic/jazz band based in Somerville, MA. In addition, Courtenay digs heavy metal, Dunkin Donuts coffee, old school Nintendo, and pet-sitting dogs (regularly keeping Milk-Bones handy for four-legged visitors). In eighth grade she was voted “a walking Hallmark Card.”
