Yuki Ito

“Sensational…having both commanding technique and a masterfully assured delivery of melody, his rubato is refined and intelligently complements the underlying harmonic movement…he is to establish himself at the pinnacle of the international scene.” (The Strad, UK)

Yuki Ito won 1st prize at both the International Brahms Competition in 2010 and the UK’s most prestigious Windsor Festival International String Competition in 2011, which led him to commence an international career.

Since his debut with the Philharmonia Orchestra in the UK, he has performed around the globe at such venues as Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Theatre Marigny, Teatro Marcello, Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, Schloss Mirabell’s Marmorsaal, Muziekgebouw, Canker Centre, tour in Croatia, Suntory Hall in Japan and Daejeon Arts Center in Korea, as soloist with esteemed orchestras and to give recitals, as well as a private recital personally invited by HRH the Prince Edward of the UK.

Amongst many distinguished artists with whom he has collaborated, including Vladimir Ashkenazy, Julian Lloyd Webber, Xavier de Maistre, and Svetlana Zakharova, he has established profound musical relationship with the world-renowned composer/conductor Johan de Meij, who praised Yuki Ito’s playing of his Cello Concerto “Casanova”, a work fondly performed by cellists around the globe, as “It is absolute perfection in all aspects…The best version I (the composer) have ever heard in my life”. In 2025 he gave the world-premiere performance of its orchestral version at Suntory Hall with the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Johan de Meij himself, and released the world-wide album “De Meij : Complete Works for Cello and Orchestra” including a new work “Elegy & Scherzo – A Tribute to Sergei Rachmaninoff” written for and dedicated to Yuki Ito.

His performing career has always been imbued with Rachmaninoff’s music – having released his world-wide debut album “Rachmaninoff : Complete Cello Works” in 2012, he internationally gave “All-Rachmaninoff” recitals every year towards the composer’s 150th birth anniversary in 2023, which was complemented by publishing his first book: a monograph “Thoughts on Rachmaninoff”.

As conductor Yuki Ito made his conducting debut at London’s St Martin-in-the-Fields in 2013, and in 2016 he led the initial Japan tour of Camerata Luanda from Republic of Angola to success, a historical event which marked the first tour in Japan ever by an African orchestra.

In recent years he has been invited to give masterclass by conservatoires such as Ljubljana Academy of Music, Slovenia, and in 2025 he served as the youngest chairman of the jury at International Music Competition “FLAME” in Paris.

He was awarded the “Hideo Saito Memorial Award” in 2019, one of the most honourable music awards in Japan, for his service to music.

Yuki Ito plays the ‘Maragarites’ cello by Paolo Antonio Testore (Milan, c.1755) enabling him to perform exclusively with their ‘Magnacore’ strings.

(As of August 2025, 460 words)