So this was supposed to be a simple post…just find a couple lists of cellists other people think are most important, sift, stir, and produce a nice list to post here. 

But… 

You know how it is, reading lists. Especially lists that purport to do any kind of ranking. You read, and you have opinions. You read, and you maybe agree…but also maybe disagree. 

And we, well, we didn’t agree with any of the lists we found. Or at least not completely. So what we are going to do here is post a couple of the lists—in super simple list format—here, with links to their more detailed original forms, and let you decide. 

In fact, maybe we can find out if the comments section of this blog area might actually work. If you have an opinion, please comment! Let us know what you think! Send us YOUR lists. 

Random greatest-cellists-list #1 (ClassicFM):

(they’ve listed these in alpha order, so no ranking is implied—raise your hand if there are cellists on this list you’d never heard of—or had never realized were cellists…or both)

  • Luigi Boccherini

  • Adrien-Francois Servais

  • Pablo Casals

  • Pierre Fournier

  • Natalia Gutman

  • Steven Isserlis

  • Julian Lloyd Webber

  • Yo-Yo Ma

  • Mischa Maisky

  • David Popper

  • Jacqueline du Pre

  • Mstislav Rostropovich

  • Heinrich Schiff

  • Janos Starker

  • Paul Tortelier

  • Alisa Welerstein

 Random greatest-cellists-list #2 (Classical-music.com):

(listed in birth order, so again, no ranking implied…except of course the fact that only SIX cellists have been included in this list)

  • Pablo Casals

  • Emanuel Feuermann

  • Gregor Piatigorsky

  • Pierre Fournier

  • Mstislav Rostropovich

  • Jacqueline du Pre

 Random greatest-cellists-list #3 (Cello Central):

(This appears to maybe random? Top-of-head?)

  • Mstislav Rostropovich

  • Jacqueline du Pre

  • Pablo Casals

  • Yo-Yo Ma

  • Julian Lloyd-Webber

  • Paul Tortelier

  • Arthur Russell

  • Luigi Boccherini

  • Jacques Offenbach

  • Pierre Fournier

  • Emanuel Feuermann

  • Alfred Wallenstein

 And that’s more than enough. Let’s see those disagreements and those new, improved lists.

Also, of course, we’ll see you at as many Cello|Fresno events as possible, so you can see the best cellists we can produce, right here! And don’t miss that final concert with the Youth Philharmonic and Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi on Sunday November 3 at 4pm at Royce Hall, Fresno High School.

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