David Finckel

Co-artistic director of the Chamber Music Society since 2004, cellist David Finckel produced a 2020-21 season, normally packed with concerts and touring, of more than 270 digital projects. Included among them are his own performances of duo and chamber repertoire, as well as lectures, viewed across the United States. Beginning in March 2020, he and Wu Han conceived and led the entire CMS multi-series pandemic programming, which included the newly-created Artist Series, an expanded Summer Evenings series, an Inside Chamber Music Plus series, the Art of Interpretation series, the Musical Heritage series, the New Milestones series, as well as mainstage concerts replacing live concerts in Alice Tully Hall. In addition, the duo produced a complete Music@Menlo 2020 digital summer festival. David Finckel and Wu Han also created CMS’s innovative Front Row National project, which has brought more than 400 CMS digital performances and events to over 60 chamber music presenters and their audiences nationally.

In 2012, David Finckel received Musical America’s Musician of the Year award, among the highest honors granted to artists by the music industry in the United States. Along with Wu Han, he is the founder and artistic director of Music@Menlo, Silicon Valley’s acclaimed chamber music festival and institute, which will celebrate its 20th season in 2022.

In 1997, he and Wu Han launched ArtistLed, classical music’s first musician-directed and Internet-based recording company, whose catalogue of over 20 releases includes the staples of the cello-piano duo repertoire as well as chamber music. Serving as cellist of the Emerson String Quartet for 34 seasons, he collected nine Grammy Awards for his 48 recordings with the legendary ensemble. The first American student of Rostropovich, David Finckel serves on the faculty at The Juilliard School and Stony Brook University.