Karen Ouzounian

Sought after for her “radiant” (The New York Times) performances full of “tremendous heart, bringing joy and a captivating sound to the stage” (The Strad), Karen Ouzounian is a GRAMMY®-nominated cellist and composer who creates music from a deeply personal place. An omnivorous musical spirit who “powerfully shatters pigeonholes with her artistic partners” (Ravinia Magazine), she has premiered numerous works and collaborated with some of the most singular musicians of our time, including Yo-Yo Ma, Rhiannon Giddens, and Augustin Hadelich.

Ouzounian has appeared as a soloist in venues including the Konzerthaus Berlin, Elbphilharmonie, Kölner Philharmonie, Tonhalle Düsseldorf, and Carnegie Hall, as well as at leading festivals such as Marlboro, Ojai, Caramoor, and Ravinia, championing a remarkable breadth of music with fierce commitment and emotional power. As a composer, recent commissions include works for the Aeolus Quartet, Silkroad Ensemble, Salt Bay Chamberfest, and the Cello Teaching Repertoire Consortium. 

In the 2026-27 season, Ouzounian appears in recital in New York, Hamburg, Chicago, Toronto, and Los Angeles, and makes her Boston Symphony Orchestra solo debut at the 2026 Tanglewood Festival as soloist in Kayhan Kalhor’s double concerto Venus in the Mirror. 

Ouzounian’s current artistic focus includes a trio of projects created with her husband, composer and animator Lembit Beecher. Mayrig (“mother” in Armenian) is an immersive and intimate 65-minute show in which the voices of Karen’s mother and grandmother are interwoven with original arrangements of Armenian music of her family’s ancestral home of Anatolia, songs and stories drawn from their post-genocide home of Lebanon, the music of Charles Aznavour and Marin Marais, and recent works by Beecher, Layale Chaker, Nathalie Joachim, Niloufar Nourbakhsh, and Ouzounian. Dear Mountains, a 42-minute work commissioned by Cantori New York and co-composed with Beecher for chorus, solo cello, oud, and percussion, juxtaposes stories told and retold in Karen’s family with scenes of music-making across the Armenian diaspora over the last 100 years, as seen through archival recordings and writings. Third in the series is Tell Me Again, a concerto for cello and orchestra which received its world premiere with conductor Eric Jacobsen and the Orlando Philharmonic, and its West Coast premiere with conductor Cristian Măcelaru at the 2024 Cabrillo Festival. 

Dedicated to the art of chamber music, Ouzounian performs as a member of the Silkroad Ensemble, and was the founding cellist of the Aizuri Quartet for 11 years, earning a GRAMMY® nomination and major chamber music prizes on three continents, and serving as the String Quartet-in-Residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As a member of The Knights, she gave the world premiere of Anna Clyne’s Shorthand for solo cello and strings, which she recorded for Avie Records and toured as soloist with the ensemble throughout Germany, Denmark, and the U.S. to critical acclaim. 

Ouzounian holds Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees from The Juilliard School and a Post-Baccalaureate Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. Born to Lebanese-Armenian parents in Toronto, she resides in New York City with her husband, Lembit Beecher. Learn more at www.karenouzounian.com.