Julia Yoshida Weldon is a cellist who recently joined the Eugene Symphony. She was a member of the cello sections in the National Repertory Orchestra in Breckenridge, Colorado and the Toho Orchestra Academy in Japan. She held principal positions with the Sinfonia de l’Ouest, McGill Symphony Orchestra, and the Oberlin Chamber Orchestra. 

With Trio Eudaemonia, she attended the International Music Workshop and Festival in Kirchberg an der Jagst, Germany as well as performed at numerous hospitals, retirement facilities and private salons. Julia gigged at weddings and events regularly with Dublin House, a collective of string players, formed from some of her closest friends and colleagues in their beloved home in Montreal. The Dublin House String Quartet recorded a work by a local Pointe-Saint-Charles elementary school music teacher and performed it for his students.

Desiring to see further institutional collaboration in the music school she attended, Julia and her colleague Rebekah Dennis were awarded a grant from McGill to co-create a symposium for graduate music students. Dialogues in Performance featured research, performances, and discussions and sought to investigate and increase collaborative processes in the performance, composition, and education disciplines in the music school and beyond. The symposium featured faculty guest lectures by professors Andrea Creech and Emmanuel Tabi as well as a premiere work by student composer, Peter Min.

Julia teaches group classes and individual private cello lessons. Recently she became an instructor with the Albany Youth Orchestra and is beginning a small private studio in Eugene. In the past she has taught with Encore! Sistema Québec and at Vanier College’s Music School in Continuing Education.

Julia’s mentors include Brian Manker, Anna Burden, Amir Eldan, Hisaya Dogin, Julie Albers, Jonathan Ruck, and Emily Stoops. She holds masters and bachelors cello performance degrees from McGill University and Oberlin Conservatory. She earned a BA in East Asian Studies with a focus on Japanese from Oberlin College.