Katri Ervamaa
Finnish-born cellist Katri Ervamaa, DMA, is a versatile performer, who specializes in chamber music, new music and creative improvisation. She has performed and given master classes throughout North America, Europe and Taiwan. Her festival appearances include the Orlando, Kuhmo, Bowdoin, Lyckå and Norrtäjle Chamber Music Festivals (with the Finnish Owla String Quartet) as well as the Denison University Tutti! New Music Festival, Poison City Music Festival and Finnfest, among others.
She has also performed at Ann Arbor’s Edgefest with Lars Hollmer’s Global Home Project, Guy Kluscevic, Mark Kirschenmann, E3Q, Andrew Bishop and Ed Sarath.
She studied cello with Erling Blöndal Bengtsson at the University of Michigan, Marc Johnson at the Northern Illinois University, Kazimierz Mikhalik in Poland and Lauri Laitinen at the Oulu Conservatory in Finland. She also studied chamber music with Andrew Jennings and the members of the Vermeer, Alban Berg, Amadeus and Borodin String Quartets, and frequently at the Britten-Pears School in England.
Katri is a founding member and past president of Brave New Works new music ensemble. She is also a member of the Muse string trio and E3Q, an improvisation-based genre-defying trio with her husband Mark Kirschenmann and percussionist Michael Gould. She has recorded with Andrew Bishop’s Hank Williams Project and Ed Sarath’s Timescape, among others, and appears on Envoy Recordings, Block M Records, and AMP Records labels. A champion of new classical music, Katri has premiered numerous chamber music and solo cello works and worked with such composers as William Bolcom, Bright Sheng, Michael Daugherty, Marilyn Shrude, Gabriela Lena Frank, Robert Morris, Chen Yi and Forrest Pierce.
In addition to her lively performance career, Katri is on faculty at the University of Michigan’s Residential College, where she is the head of the music program and teaches chamber music. She has also been on the cello faculty at the Eastern Michigan and Bowling Green State Universities. Most recently, she has given master classes and participated in residencies at Cornell and Oklahoma State Universities, University of Puget Sound and the Oulu Conservatory in Finland. Katri is a mother of three and lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan with her family.
