Ned Kellenberger
Ned joined the Grammy-nominated St. Petersburg Quartet in 2021, with whom he founded Leopold Auer Music Festival, a summer music camp for dedicated strings and piano students. In 2021 Ned also founded Leopold Auer Music Academy with members of the quartet, serving as artistic director and instructor of violin and chamber music. He is an owner of The Village Music Academy in Kansas City, where he teaches violin and piano classes. He serves as executive director of the Mendelssohn Foundation and is editor-in-chief for newly founded Felix Mendelssohn Press. He spent 2020 as a school principal and senior teacher at Wolfgang Violin Studio in Singapore, and he has also taught in various capacities at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, Illinois College, the University of Illinois Springfield, the Conservatory of Central Illinois, and the Champaign School of Music.
Ned recently published peer-reviewed articles with Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Speculum Musicae, and the Beethoven Journal, and since 2018 he regularly contributes to the American Record Guide as an independent music critic. Last year the New Beethoven Research Conference in Boston invited him to present research on Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. This year he presented at the Beethoven the European conference in Lucca, Italy, and at the AMS Midwest conference at the University of Iowa.
Ned is an active AmSAT-certified teacher of the Alexander Technique, a medically proven method for improving body movement and usage. Through the Alexander Technique he engages musicians to help them avoid repeated stress injuries and maintain physical health. In 2017 he graduated from the teacher training course of Alex and Joan Murray, who have served as key international exponents of the Alexander Technique for over 50 years.
Ned has served as concertmaster of various orchestras and music festivals, including the Philadelphia International Music Festival and Vienna Music Festival. He is associate concertmaster of the Suprima Chamber Orchestra, with whom he performed in Russia at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in Glazunov Hall for its XII International Conservatory Week and at Bargemusic in Brooklyn, New York. His extensive ensemble experience includes performances at Altes Rathaus and Odeon Theater in Vienna, Austria, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center’s Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, and the Mann Center in Philadelphia. With his piano quintet he recently embarked on a European tour with the Alion Baltic Music Festival through Latvia, Lituania, Estonia, and Finland. He has performed throughout the USA, Canada, and Mexico, and gave numerous performances during his tenure in Singapore.
Ned completed both a Doctor of Musical Arts and Master of Music degree with Megan Freivogel and the Jupiter String Quartet at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. He studied for his Bachelor of Music at Wichita State University with Nancy Luttrell, Alla Aranovskaya, and the St. Petersburg String Quartet. He plays an early 20th century German violin named Fritz in honor of legendary violinist Fritz Kreisler.