Season highlights have included a performance with violinist Midori Goto in Dvorak's American String Quartet at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. Tina also performed with her progressive metal band "Off the Deep End" at the wrap party for the Sundance Film Festival in Utah, and was featured in a wildlife benefit concert at the Playboy Mansion. She has also performed with Stevie Wonder, Josh Groban, John Legend, and Michael McDonald, and was featured in a show for the PGA. Tina recently recorded solo cello for John Legend and Tila Tequila, shot a music video with Kelly Clarkson and Reba McEntire, played in the soundtrack for Will Smith's blockbuster movie "Hancock" and on the TV show "Family Guy" among many others. Tina was also featured on the electric cello in an album for the Yamaha SV Quartet Series which were distributed to music programs in schools nationwide, introducing electric string instruments to the music curriculum in America. At NAMM 2009, Tina also performed for Yamaha.

Tina toured with rock/classical crossover girl-band "Metaphor" through Australia, performing 22 consecutive shows in 21 cities on the electric cello. She also traveled to France and Brazil with the "Pegasus Piano Trio" for the Franco-Américaine Rencontre de Musique de la Chambre at the Château de la Bretesche in Missillac and the Rio XIII International Cello Encounter. Tina performed the Elgar Concerto with the Petrobras Symphony while in Brazil, and the concert was broadcasted on national television. After Brazil, Tina performed with crossover pianist William Joseph in Majorca, Spain for the International Philanthropy Summit.

Tina recently gave a classical cello masterclass at Colorado State University, and also presented three classical and alternative electric cello workshops at local high schools in the state. She demonstrated the diversity of the cello to the students in the band, orchestra, and choir classes to hundreds of students at these public and special program schools. Tina also gave masterclasses in Brazil at the XIV Rio International Cello Encounter in 2008.

Tina has won first prize in many competitions, including the Music Heritage Inc. String Competition, the MTAC, ASTA, and CAPMT California State Solo Competitions, and the Parness Concerto Competition for Young Artists; she was awarded the "Most Promising Talent" Award at the California Young Artists Competition. A published composer, Tina has also been awarded first place in the MTNA California State Composition Competition for her series of cello duets. They can be found in Davina Music Publications' chamber music books.

Tina began playing the cello under the instruction of her father, Lu-Yan Guo. She then continued her studies with Professor Eleonore Schoenfeld and Nathaniel Rosen at the the University of Southern California's Thorton School of Music on full scholarship. Tina has just finished recording her first solo CD, "Autumn Winds," a classical/new-age album which will be released in February 2009. She is currently in the studio recording her second CD, "Apocalypse," a progressive metal album which will feature the electric cello.

Tina performs and records on a 1787 Perry on loan from the Colburn Foundation.

On electric cello, she plays the Yamaha SVC-200 and is an Official Yamaha Performing Artist and Clinician.

Tina is endorsed by Carvin and uses the BR610 Bass Combo Amp. She is also endorsed by Voodoo Lab, Coffin Case, Pedaltrain, Zoom, and Samson.

REVIEWS


Indaba Music Online, 16 January 2009
By Yo-Yo Ma:
"Very Virtuosic."

All Access Magazine, 13 November 2008
By Giuseppe S. Canzonieri:
"Saying that Tina is a talented musician is understatement."

The Pueblo Chieftan, 11 March 2007
By Pierre Canyon:
"Guo admits that the cello is the way she best expresses her passion for life with what she feels deep in her heart. This comes out clearly in her performance of the Dvorak cello concerto. The performance of the Dvorak cello concerto proved to be a delight to the
ear, the mind and the heart. Guo's performance, in particular, provided a focus for our attention that
was the highlight of the program."

El Sol de Toluca, 13 October 2006
By Gabriela Rangel:
"Guo's interpretive quality and flawless performance was moving and excited the audience immensely. She is a great artist at only 20 years old."

ARTIST STATEMENT


"When I play my cello, I am completely pure, naked, and open. I long for the moments when my outer shell no longer matters. I hunger for every genuine tear of sorrow, joy, or understanding shared. When you can hear me for who I am, and see me in a way that doesn't involve looking at me, but rather looking through me, only then can I be satisfied.

When I play, I see ghosts. I am only aware of undiluted emotions manifesting; those that arise from the tribulations of life and of death, of the most beautiful love and the most heart wrenching grief. The same purity of feeling that has inspired every creator of art, of music; every human being that has ever dreamed of an ideal, lives in the flowing melodies. Expression through an abstract is blessed in its form to be free from the stains of reality.

When I make music, I rediscover my identity. Not a daughter, a sister, a lover, nor a friend, but only one soul connected to every other person that has walked the earth.

I ache to show you what is inside my heart. I ache to be understood. I ache for all of us to understand our humanity. I ache to tell the world an eternal story. Watch me, hear me pray in the only way I know how."

Contact

Email: tina_g@classicalmatters.com

Personal Website: tinaguo.com

MySpace page

Facebook page

Just Released - Spring 2009

Available at:

"Autumn Winds" - Tina's Debut CD!