Suzanne Smith has performed and taught for over 30 years. She earned a performance degree at Oberlin Conservatory under the late Richard Kapusicinski and went on to complete her Masters in Music at S.U.N.Y as a student of Bernard Greenhouse, co-founder of the Beaux Arts Trio. Her Suzuki Training was done with Gilda Barston and Evonne Tate. While on scholarship at the Hull House Festival in Chicago, she had the honor of receiving a private lesson from Dr. Suzuki. She has studied in master class with: Lynn Harrell, Jules Eskin, and Rya Garbosova. Suzanne's chamber music coaches include Joseph Gingold, Walter Trampler, Louis Kroll, Joseph Silverstien, and past Fine Arts Quartet cellist, Lowell Creitz. She has received fellowships to attend The Scotia Festival, Sarasota Festival and the Tanglewood Music Festival where she performed in the fellowship orchestra under Colin Davis and Michael Tillson Thomas. While there, she was principle cellist under conductor Seiji Ozawa performing the Brahms piano concerto no. 2. with Andre Watts. From 2008-2010 she traveled to Bloomington Indiana several times a year to study with Janos Starker.
Ms. Smith has played chamber music with the Michigan Chamber Players, the Pennsylvania Chamber players and members of The Detroit Symphony Orchestra. She has also performed as principle cellist with The Jackson Symphony, The McComb Symphony and the Delaware Valley Symphony. She was a member of the Trenton Symphony, in Trenton, N.J. for six years. Present chamber music performance colleagues include: Diane Monroe, violinist and member of the Uptown Quartet; Katherine Collier, University of Michigan piano faculty; Pamela Frey, violist of the Wister Quartet; and Susanne Son, top-prize winner of the Canadian Music Competition and the Chalmers Award from the Ontario Arts Council.
"You have to have confidence before you put your hands on the instrument." Janos Starker.
Her cellistic work has been impacted by her study of Zen, or "Ch'an" Buddhism for that past 20 years. "Ch'an", as in the name CelloChanWoods means deep understanding. Her mentor was the late Zen Master Sheng Yen for whom a chair at Columbia University has been dedicated. Suzanne has participated in numerous Zen retreats using the method of silent illumination, and as a result, is able to clearly communicate to her students how to effectively sit, move, focus, and open up at the cello. CelloChanWoods is not a religious or Buddhist retreat, but an opportunity to explore the joy of music making through the study of the unification of mind and body. Suzanne founded cellochan in 1994 and has a studio of 30 students. *See cellochan.com
"Suzanne Smith is a very gifted cellist. Very sensitive, extremely intelligent, and a most pleasant character. She deserves a place in the music world either as performer or teacher and I recommend her most highly."
Bernard Greenhouse ~ Founder of The Beaux Arts Trio.
"I was really quite excited about what I saw and heard. I noted that your young cellists, in general, have unusually good positions and I was especially pleased with their freedom of motion. As you know, the fluidity of motion has so much to do with the beauty of the sound, especially with the cello, I felt that Claire and Suzanne must be unusually sensitive to this. I have the distinct impression that they are doing beautiful work and that they are to be prized highly."
Phyllis Young ~ Author of "The String Game", former president of the American String Teachers Association, and professor of cello and string pedagogy at the University of Texas at Austin.
