Michelle Kesler
Faith + Works Lecturer 2018 - 2019
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Bio
Dr. Michelle Kesler is Assistant Professor of Cello at Brigham Young University. She has distinguished herself as a chamber musician and soloist in a wide number of performances in Europe, the US, and New Zealand. She has performed with the Beethoven festival in Park City, and has worked with quartets such as the Orion, New Zealand String Quartet, St. Lawrence, Takacs, Tokyo, and Brentano String Quartets.
Michelle is a sought-after clinician, having conducted master classes for aspiring young artists throughout the U.S and abroad. Her students have found success continuing their studies at prestigious graduate schools and winning regional and national competitions. She is also an active orchestral musician and has played with orchestras around the United States. Michelle is passionate about new music and is actively commissioning, performing and premiering new works. During the summer she has taught at The Vianden International music festival in Luxembourg as well as the Young Musician’s music festival held at Brigham Young University. In Fall 2018 she was the National Parks Artist-In-Residence at two National Historic Sites and Monuments, Hubbell Trading Post, and Canyon de Chelly in Northeastern Arizona where she gave performances and taught in the local schools. She was recently invited to give a lecture recital at the College Music Society’s conference in 2017 featuring works inspired by the Grand Canyon.
Before joining the faculty at the University, she received her bachelors degree at the University of Colorado in Boulder studying with Judith Glyde, and Andras Fejer of the Takacs quartet. She received her Doctoral and Masters degree at Arizona State University studying with Thomas Landschoot. While pursuing her masters and doctorate degrees, she has enjoyed performing with the Phoenix Symphony, The Arizona Opera, and the Phoenix Opera Company. She is currently a member of the Deseret String Quartet.
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FAITH + WORKS LECTURE SERIES
A Sacred Process
Cello Professor at BYU School of Music
A SACRED PROCESS
“I started to think about how my faith related to these long hours of practice. I never questioned the importance or value of the performance and how much that can communicate to an audience, how meaningful and profound that is,” said Kesler. “For me, I wanted the practice hours to be an end in itself.”
For Kesler, the turning point to finding meaning in the creative process was viewing it as a sacred process.
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To see other lectures from this series, visit the Faith + Works Lecture Series home page.