Described as a “consummate master of the bow” by The Strad magazine, Chinese-Australian cellist Yelian He is the winner of the 2009 Royal Over-Seas League String Competition in London and the Grand Prize and Audience Prize winner of the 2014 Australian Cello Awards competition in Sydney (now the Young Performer’s Awards).

 

Yelian studied with Karine Georgian, Liwei Qin, Janis Laurs, Christian Wojtowich, and Nelson Cooke. Through his education, he has also performed for Antonio Meneses, Jian Wang, Ralph Kirshbaum, Julian Lloyd-Webber, Roels Dietens, Gary Hoffman, Lawrence Lesser, Valter Despalj, and Hannah Roberts.

 

He has performed at numerous renowned venues and festivals including Wigmore Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Bridgewater Concert Hall, City Recital Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Hamer Hall, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Brighton Festival, Deal Festival, Melbourne & Adelaide International Cello Festivals, Port Fairy Spring Music Festival and Woodend Winter Arts Festival. During his travels, Yelian has performed with the Sydney Symphony, West Australian Symphony, Melbourne Symphony, Philharmonia, Auckland Philharmonia, Shanghai Philharmonic, Malaysian Philharmonic, and the Halle orchestras.

In November 2017, Yelian and Yasmin released the CD “Y2” with Willowhayne Records, comprising of an eclectic selection of composers such as Mendelssohn, Kapustin, Schumann-Liszt, Henryson and Piazzolla; the CD includes some of their favourite works both large and small, on and off the stage. It was picked up by British Airways for the in-flight entertainment from January 2018. They have also released their first and second music videos of Chopin’s Cello Sonata 3^rd movement and Nikolai Kapustin’s Burlesque for piano and cello. Commissioned by the City Music Foundation in London and shot inside a Chapel in Peckham, the videos subsequently premiered in the Rebecca Hossack Gallery in central London in October 2016.

 

Yelian studies Wing Chun Kung Fu with Master Darryl Moy, the same martial art studied by Bruce Lee and featured in the recent releases of the box office blockbuster “Ip Man” movies. Twice a week, Yelian teaches his class in Melbourne. With this background, he curates a Kung Fu Cellist series at the Melbourne Recital Centre each year, with the purpose of highlighting the skills and personalities of the performers.

 

Yelian plays on a cello made in 2018 by Yanbing Chen, as well as a cello by Hungarian luthier Adolphus Monnig made in 1877.

 

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