Cellist Kirsten Whitson performs extensively as a soloist, chamber, and orchestral musician. She has played throughout the US, Europe, Japan, and Cuba with Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Minnesota Opera, Milwaukee Symphony, Florida Orchestra, and Norway's Bergen Philharmonic. She has also performed at the Festival of the Lakes in Alexandria, MN, the Grand Teton Music Festival, the Lakes Area Music Festival in Brainerd, MN, and with Zeitgeist New Music.
Kirsten has presented solo cello concerts throughout the Twin Cities and greater Minnesota for over 20 years. She has been featured on programs broadcast by KFAI and Minnesota Public Radio. She is passionate about the extensive repertoire available for solo cello and has premiered several commissioned pieces. Composers Timothy C. Takach, David Evan Thomas, Carl Witt, and Jocelyn Hagen have written music for her. One of Jocelyn Hagen's pieces for her involved live digital looping. Kirsten recorded Louise Farrenc’s Sonata in Bb Major, Opus 46, with Mary Ellen Haupert for Centaur Records.
Kirsten received a B.M. and an Artist Diploma from Indiana University, where she studied with Fritz Magg and Janos Starker. While at Indiana University, Kirsten was Fritz Magg’s assistant and won a coveted Performer’s Certificate.
Kirsten received Artist Initiative Grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board in 2002 and 2018, a grant from the Metropolitan Consortium of Community Developers in 2020, a Creative Support Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board in 2021, and is a 2020 McKnight Artist Fellow. She was selected as a 2022 Resident Artist at Ragdale, supported by the McKnight Foundation.
Solo Repertoire
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 1 in G Major
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 2 in d minor
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 3 in C Major
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 4 in Eb Major
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 5 in c minor
Bach, J.S. - Suite No. 6 in D Major
Bloch, Ernest - Suite No. 1
Cassadó, Gaspar - Suite
Hagen, Jocelyn - Origami
Hagen, Jocelyn - Rotor
Hindemith, Paul - Sonata, Op. 25, No. 3
Kancheli, Giya - Having Wept
Kennedy, John - The Morning Inside Us
Kodály, Zoltán - Solo Cello Sonata, Op. 8
O’Connor, Mark - Appalachia Waltz
Rautavaara, Einojuhani - Sonata, Op. 46
Sculthorpe, Peter - Requiem for Cello Alone
Summer, Mark - Julie-O
Summer, Mark - Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming
Takach, Timothy C. - The Ground Blurs
Takach, Timothy C. - Thirty-Eight Tears
Tavener, John - Threnos
Thomas, David Evan - Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Ung, Chinary - Khse Buon
Walker, Gwyneth - In Memoriam
Weinberg, Mieczyslaw - Solo Cello Sonata No. 1, Op. 72
Williams, John - Three Pieces for Solo Cello