ADRIANNA KHOO currently performs in chamber groups, orchestras, operas and musicals across the San Francisco Bay Area in addition to maintaining her private lessons studio. 

As a performer, Adrianna appreciates eclectic programming.  Recent highlights include producing the Red Cello Quartet’s benefit for the International Rescue Committee San Jose with music from Mendelssohn to Lady Gaga, and  joining the Hong Kong City Chamber Orchestra’s Forbidden City tour with Celtic dancers in Beijing.  Adrianna has produced and performed rock and jazz programs at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center, First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum, SESAC Showcase at the Rockwood Music Hall, (NY), and The Fringe Club and City Hall, (Hong Kong). As a classically trained orchestra player, Adrianna has performed with the New England Philharmonic, Plymouth and Richmond County orchestras on the east coast.  She also served as the principal cellist of the University of Southern California Community Orchestra and Sacramento Youth symphonies, and assistant principal at the South Bay Symphony and University of California Berkeley orchestras.

As a passionate teacher, Adrianna believes that all children can learn music when teachers and parents team up to foster students’ curiosity and creativity.  As a Suzuki Method and Orff trained teacher, Adrianna pioneered the cello program at KinderU Suzuki Music Academy – the first Suzuki School in China recognized by the International Suzuki Association.  She went on to create the first Suzuki Cello Programs at Sycamore Strings Academy in Livermore, California and West Valley Music in Silicon Valley. In addition to teaching private lessons, she currently coaches cello at local public school orchestras and guest teaches at the El Sistema inspired program, Harmony Project. Adrianna also teaches at Cello Kids – Cellobello.com’s free online lessons for children worldwide.

Her studio’s highlights include a special class performance during the Matsumoto 2013 Suzuki World Conference.  Students have performed with the Hong Kong Philharmonic and the Metropolitan Youth Orchestra, where Adrianna served as a coach.  Annual studio benefit concerts  have raised money for the San Francisco ASPCA, World Wildlife Federation and Japan and Philippines disaster relief. Adrianna’s students have won command performances in the CMEA Music Festival and earned positions in the CODA All State Honors Orchestras, as well as local private community honors orchestras in the  Bay Area. 

Adrianna was a graduate scholarship student of Grammy nominated cellist, Terry King at the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa Honors with a B.A. in English from the University of California Berkeley.  She holds an M.A. in Journalism from the University of Southern California, where she earned the Hearst, Asian American Journalist and Lohan scholarships to write in Los Angeles and Cape Town, South Africa.  Adrianna was formerly a litigation reporter at the Los Angeles Daily Journal and a Public Relations Specialist for the National I Have a Dream Foundation in New York – a youth development program which has helped more than 15,000 underserved youth go to college.   

Contact: redcellostudio@gmail.com