Katja Linfield

Katja Linfield, who joined the Minnesota Orchestra in 1990, is an active chamber musician and proponent of contemporary and lesser-known works. In recent seasons she has performed Tan Dun’s Elegy: Snow in June for solo cello and four percussionists, John Mackey’s bluegrass string trio Wrong-Mountain Stomp and Judd Greenstein’s string quartet Four on the Floor. She has also performed works of Dvořák, Hindemith, Brahms, Mozart, Mendelssohn and Golijov.

Linfield was a member of the Bakken Trio from 1992 until 2002, a period during which the ensemble recorded works of Ives, Pärt and Beethoven. She has twice received the McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians, in 2006 as soloist and in 2001 with the Bakken Trio.

Linfield has performed chamber music at the Marlboro Music Festival, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Tanglewood Festival, Portland Chamber Music Festival, Music in the Vineyards, Cactus Pear Music Festival, Alexandria Festival of the Lakes, Phipps Center for the Arts, Music on the Hill in Mankato and the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Festival in Madison, Wisconsin. She has toured the United States with Music from Marlboro and Europe with the Frankfurt-based Ensemble Modern.

Linfield earned a bachelor of music degree from Oberlin College and a master’s degree from the New England Conservatory and Rutgers University. Outside of her career as a cellist, Linfield is an avid ice hockey player on the WHAM (Women's Hockey Association of Minnesota) team, the Ravens.