Born and raised in Berlin, Germany, Ole Akahoshi is known for the rare combination of musical sensitivity and technical mastery, which has earned the admiration of musicians and critics across the globe.
As a soloist he has performed with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s under the direction of Yehudi Menuhin, Symphonisches Orchester Berlin, and the Czechoslovakian Radio Orchestra, among others. The Los Angeles Times praised his performance of the Haydn Concerto for its “technical solidity, fluent passage work and perfect intonation,” continuing, “Akahoshi made a large and edgeless tone of a buttered-rum quality, and conquered all the many hurdles of his assignment with panache.”
Akahoshi has collaborated with such esteemed musicians as Sarah Chang, Leon Fleisher, Ani Kavafian, Karl Leister, Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, Garrick Ohlsson, Gil Shaham, David Shifrin, the Tokyo String Quartet, the Michelangelo Quartet, and the Keller Quartet. He has also performed and served on the faculties at numerous festivals including the Aspen Music Festival, Banff Centre for the Arts, and Norfolk Chamber Music Festival.
He was the youngest cellist to be accepted as a student of the legendary Pierre Fournier at the age of eleven. Later, he continued his studies with Aldo Parisot at the Juilliard School and at the Yale School of Music, and with Janos Starker at Indiana University. He is now the director of the Yale Cellos, a Grammy-nominated ensemble, and is Assistant Professor of Cello at the Yale School of Music. He is also on the faculty at Manhattan School of Music and at Longy School of Music of Bard College.
Akahoshi joined the Horszowski Trio in 2020.