Bjorn Ranheim

Cellist Bjorn Ranheim was appointed to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in 2005 and is a member of the Sun Valley Music Festival in Idaho. He served as principal cellist with the Colorado Music Festival from 2006–2015 and has performed and toured with the orchestras of Cleveland, Atlanta, Detroit, and Baltimore.

Ranheim has been featured as soloist on multiple occasions with the SLSO, New World Symphony, and Colorado Music Festival, as well as with the Monteux Festival Orchestra, St. Louis Philharmonic, Metropolitan Orchestra of St. Louis, Columbia Civic Orchestra, National Repertory Orchestra, and the Washington University Symphony Orchestra.

Actively performing in chamber music, Ranheim has toured extensively in the United States, Europe, and Central America, with performances at Carnegie Hall, Boston’s Gardner Museum, Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica, and the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. He has participated in the Isaac Stern Chamber Music Seminar, Costa Rica International Chamber Music Festival, Amelia Island Chamber Music Festival, Jackson Hole Chamber Music Festival, and Missouri Chamber Music Festival.

Ranheim is highly visible throughout the St. Louis region, presenting recitals, educational programs and chamber music performances. In January 2020, he was featured alongside St. Louis Symphony Orchestra Artist-in-Residence, pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, in Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No. 2 as part of Washington University’s Great Artist Series. He is a frequent recital partner of famed soprano, Christine Brewer, and is a core member of the Chamber Music Society of St. Louis. He was the cellist with Washington University’s Eliot Piano Trio with St. Louis Symphony concertmaster, David Halen, and the late pianist, Seth Carlin. Ranheim’s recording of J.S. Bach Suite No. 3 for Unaccompanied Cello was released on AAM Recordings in 2013.

Seeking out new directions and partners in music making, Ranheim has collaborated with internationally known jazz musicians, sharing the stage and recording studio with Branford Marsalis, Christian McBride, Peter Martin, Jeremy Davenport, and Brian Owens. In spring 2011, Ranheim appeared on the nationally renowned radio program, A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor, performing alongside jazz vocalist, Erin Bode. He is a founding member of The 442s, an acoustic ensemble that pursues innovative, genre-defying music making and collaborations.

A committed advocate of contemporary solo and chamber music, Ranheim has given world-premiere performances of works by the late Stephen Paulus, Paul Schoenfield, Steven Heitzig, Peter Martin, Stefan Freund, Christopher Stark, and William Beckstrand.

From 2016–2021, Ranheim served as Music Director for the World Chess Hall of Fame, curating 24 concerts per season on two distinct series featuring performers from across the musical spectrum.

As a mentor and coach, Ranheim has been invited to work with the fellows of the New World Symphony, Indiana University Summer Music Festival, and the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. He has been a featured contributor to MUSAIC—the online video lesson library curated by the New World Symphony as well as the Online Music Academy produced by the Sheldon Concert Hall in St. Louis.

Ranheim studied at The Cleveland Institute of Music under the tutelage of Stephen Geber, former principal cellist of the Cleveland Orchestra, and is an alumnus of the New World Symphony, America’s Orchestral Academy, in Miami Beach, Florida.

He lives in the historic Shaw neighborhood of St. Louis with his wife, Dorie, their beautiful daughters, Inga and Freya and their Hungarian Vizsla, Ginger.