Alisa Weilerstein

Alisa Weilerstein is an American cellist known for her consummate artistry, interpretative depth and for championing contemporary approaches to classical music.

Born in Rochester, New York to a musical family, Weilerstein began playing the cello at an early age – making her debut with the Cleveland Orchestra at the age of 13 – and has gone on to become one of the foremost cellists of our time, performing as a soloist with major orchestras on four continents. But despite her globe-trotting she hasn’t forgotten her roots, regularly performing with her parents, violinist Donald Weilerstein and pianist Vivian Hornik Weilerstein as The Weilerstein Trio.

A champion of contemporary classical music, she has worked extensively with composers including Osvaldo Golijov, Lera Auerbach and Joseph Hillman, while her versatility across the full breadth of the cello repertoire has seen her chosen to premiere important new concertos by Pascal Dusapin, Matthias Pintscher, and Joan Tower.

Widely recognised as an authority on Bach’s music for unaccompanied cello, in spring 2020 Weilerstein released a best-selling recording of his solo suites for Pentatone, and streamed them through her innovative #36DaysOfBach project. And in 2023 she began her multi-season solo cello project ‘FRAGMENTS’, which sees her weave together the 36 movements of Bach’s solo cello suites with 27 new commissions in a multisensory production by Elkhanah Pulitzer to reimagine the concert experience. As part of her 2025/26 Artist Residency here at the Southbank Centre she brought three of these pieces – Emergence, Labyrinth and Wonder – to our auditoria.