Norwegian cellist Erlend Vestby is in high demand as a chamber musician and recitalist, frequently performing with small ensembles and chamber orchestras, often as guest principal. This includes the Piccadilly Sinfonietta, British Sinfonia, Opera Holland Park, Brandenburg Sinfonia and Brandenburg Baroque Soloists, Florilegium, Orchestra Nova, Gabrieli, Gothic Opera, Ensemble OrQuesta and Sinfonia Smith Square (former Southbank Sinfonia). He also enjoys the larger symphonic works and has performed across the UK, Europe and Asia, including the Royal Albert Hall, Barbican Hall, Bridgewater Hall, Windsor Castle, Konzerthaus Berlin, Oslo Concert Hall, National Forum of Music Wroclaw, Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre and Tokyo Opera City. Erlend was also on the extras list for the Norwegian Radio Orchestra and Stavanger Symphony Orchestra when living in Norway. He has been a soloist with various orchestras both in the UK and abroad, but he mostly enjoys giving solo recitals where the music of Bach is often present, as well as exploring lesser-known works from all eras.
Erlend has played for cellists such as Clemens Hagen, Hannah Roberts, Valentin Erben, Miklos Perenyi, Adrian Brendel, Stephan Kropfitch, Natalie Clein, Morten Zeuthen, Antonio Meneses, Karine Georgian, Claudio Bohórquez, Mats Lidström and Torleif Thedéen. As a recitalist he has appeared on Classic FM, the London Festival of Baroque Music and Dart Music Festival. Erlend had the opportunity to record the first Cello Suite by Bach in the main hall of the Polish Radio Orchestra in Katowice in 2018. He became part of the RCM Gateway and Professional Engagement Schemes during his studies that awarded him further solo recital opportunities.
Erlend is a diverse musician, also giving concerts on the baroque cello. He studied the baroque cello at the RCM with Richard Tunnicliffe and became a big part of the Historical Performance Department. He has enjoyed performances in for instance St. George’s Hannover Square, Queen’s Gallery Buckingham Palace, Old Royal Naval College, Dartington Hall, Cadogan Hall and at the Royal Festival Hall. Erlend enjoyed the professional experience scheme of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in 2022.
Erlend is also a keen researcher. His research on historical performance practice (early 18th to early 20th centuries) is presented in the form of webinars and lecture recitals which he has held across London, including at the RCM Music & Ideas series, at the London Festival of Baroque Music and for the London Mozart Players friends. In 2020, he made a historically informed recording of the Elgar Cello Concerto with an orchestra of London freelancers based off his own research. Erlend has also performed with the Gabrieli Players and conductor Paul McCreesh in Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius on historical instruments. They made an award-winning studio recording which was published in early 2024. He was invited back the following year for an acclaimed performance of the Verdi Requiem in Ely Cathedral.
Erlend graduated with a Master of Music in Performance with Jakob Kullberg at the Royal College of Music (RCM), London, in July 2019. His studies were supported by the Anglo-Norse Society, Trygve Tellefsen’s Foundation, Johannes and Enny Johnsen’s Foundation and Anders Sveaas’ Charitable Foundation. Alongside his studies in London, Erlend completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Music Performance in June 2018 at the University of Stavanger (UiS), Norway, with Jakob Kullberg, where he was awarded the UiS Student Prize for his outstanding artistic and academic qualities and for contributing to an active musical environment in Stavanger to the acclaim of public, professors and fellow students. Erlend holds a Bachelor of Music in Performance from the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo with Aage Kvalbein and Audun Sandvik. In 2013 he undertook an exchange year to the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester to study with Philip Higham.
In 2017, Erlend became Jakob Kullberg’s unofficial teaching assistant at the Royal College of Music, teaching RCM students up to Artist Diploma level. He also assisted Kullberg in the development of a new book of exercises with detailed descriptions on how to accomplish various musical and technical aspects of playing the cello. Since 2018 he has been establishing a private student base, now based in Winchester, and enjoys teaching students of all ages and levels, both in person and online. Read more about his teaching experience here.
Since a young age and throughout his studies, Erlend have actively learned music theory, analysis, composition, orchestration and arranging, and these skills have followed him closely as a performing cellist. He gained distinction in the composition and performance module at the Royal Northern College of Music (2014) with Dr David Horne, and in the orchestration module at the Royal College of Music (2018) with Dr Jonathan Pitkin. Erlend’s compositions and arrangements have been performed in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the UK and Brazil. He writes all the arrangements performed by his cello duo, The Duettists. Erlend had a project in 2016 together with the British composers Katie Chatburn and Dr Simon Cummings where they focused on finding new ways of equal and creative collaborations in the writing of new music for solo cello. As a pupil of Jakob Kullberg, praised internationally for his performances of the modern cello concerto, Erlend have gained invaluable insights into the interpretation and performance of contemporary music, notably by Per Nørgård as well as been given the opportunity to perform Kaija Saariaho’s music for the composer herself. He will premiere a new cello concerto by composer Alla Sirenko in the end of November 2025.
