Robert deMaine

Among the most prominent orchestral cellists in the U.S., Robert deMaine also performs widely as a soloist and is a significant educator. He is the principal cellist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. DeMaine was born on December 6, 1969, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. His sister, a fine cellist, gave him his first lessons beginning at age four. He made rapid progress, and by 12, he was performing Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Rococo Theme, Op. 33, with the Oklahoma City Philharmonic. Over the next few years, deMaine caught the attention of top cellists Leonard Rose and Pierre Fournier and was admitted to the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute, but his parents decided that he should finish high school at home (he would later study with Rose anyhow). For two years, he took no cello lessons, but then he entered and won the Naftzger Young Artists Competition in Wichita, Kansas, resulting in full scholarships for studies at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, and later Yale University. DeMaine attended classes at various other festivals and schools, including the Aspen Music Festival, the Gregor Piatigorsky Seminar at the University of Southern California, and the Kronberg Academy in Germany. Among his teachers, in addition to Rose, were Felix Galimir, Joseph Silverstein, and János Starker. His career was helped along by contest victories, including one at the Irving M. Klein International Competition for Strings in San Francisco, where he was the first cellist to win. DeMaine was already playing in orchestras as an Eastman freshman when he joined the Rochester Philharmonic. He went on to a position as core principal cellist with Connecticut's Hartford Symphony Orchestra while studying at Yale, and in 2002, he was hired by conductor Neeme Järvi as principal cellist of the Detroit Symphony. He became principal cellist of the Los Angeles Philharnonic under Gustavo Dudamel in 2012. DeMaine has also performed as a soloist under such conductors as Leonard Slatkin, John Williams, and Zubin Mehta. An influential educator, he has taught at the Hartford Conservatory, Wayne State University in Detroit, the University of Michigan, and the Colburn School in Los Angeles. An advocate for contemporary music, deMaine has performed many new works written for him, including cello concertos by John Zoltek ("Through Tamarack and Pine"), Jeremy Cavaterra, and Thomas Flaherty, among others, as well as Christopher Theofanidis' "Summer Verses" for violin and cello. In addition to orchestral, chamber music, and film soundtrack recordings (including Randy Newman's score for Cars 3), deMaine has released several solo recordings on the Leaf Music label, beginning with an album of cello-and-piano works by Fauré, Grieg, and Rachmaninov with pianist Andrew Armstrong. In 2022, deMaine and pianist Peter Takács issued a complete recording of Beethoven's music for cello and piano.
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