KATIE KENNEDY, director and cello faculty, based in Hartford, Connecticut enjoys an active and varied performing and teaching career. As an orchestral player, she performs with the Hartford Symphony, New Hampshire Music Festival, Portland Symphony, New Haven Symphony and numerous choral groups including Concora, Voce and Yale Camerata. She has collaborated with composers, dancers, and film-makers. She enjoys theater work and has played shows at the Long Wharf Theater, the Bushnell and Hartford Stage, including the original production of the musical Anastasia. Kennedy has given numerous chamber music and new music recitals including performances at Brown University, Dartmouth College, Hartt College of Music, Hartford Art School, Harvard University, Trinity College (CT), SUNY Stonybrook, University of Maine. Her performances have been broadcast on National Public Radio, Performance Today and Maine Public Radio. She has also enjoyed accompanying and collaborating with pop acts on occasion including Stevie Wonder and Idina Menzel.

Kennedy teaches cello and chamber music as a faculty member at the University of Hartford’s Hartt School and formerly taught at the Loomis Chaffee School and the Community Music School in Springfield. Her students have earned top prizes and first chairs in state-wide competitions, festivals and youth orchestras. Kennedy began cello studies with her dad, Jim Kennedy, went on to receive a B.M. in cello performance from Oberlin College Conservatory where she studied with Peter Rejto, and continued her studies at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest, Hungary with Csaba Onczay.