BIO

Winner of the 2020 GRAMMY Award for Best Chamber Music/ Small Ensemble Performance, violinist Keiko Tokunaga spends most of her days touring and performing globally as a soloist and chamber musician. Ms. Tokunaga has performed, toured and recorded extensively with the internationally acclaimed Attacca Quartet from 2005 to 2019, and has been praised by the Strings Magazine for possessing a sound “with probing quality that is supple and airborne” and for her “pure, pellucid bow strokes”. Ms. Tokunaga has soloed with various orchestras including the Spanish National Orchestra, Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya and Virginia Arts Festival Chamber Orchestra. She has appeared in such major venues as Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Library of Congress, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Rubin Museum, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, the Banff Centre in Canada, Sociedad Filarmonica de Bilbao in Spain, Ohji Hall and Suntory Hall in Tokyo, and Izumi Hall in Osaka among others. In 2016, Ms. Tokunaga  released her debut album, Jewels, from New York Classics Label.

While Ms. Tokunaga played the Attacca Quartet, the ensemble won numerous prestigious awards including the GRAMMY Award for Best Small Ensemble Performance, First Prize of the 7th Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in 2011; the Third Prize and the Australian Broadcast Corporation Classic FM Listener’s Choice Award of the 6th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition in 2011. The Attacca Quartet served as the Graduate String Quartet in Residence at The Juilliard School from 2011 till 2013, and as as artist-in-residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the 2014-15 season.

When she is not on the road, Ms. Tokunaga enjoys her career as an educator. She is currently on faculty at The Juilliard School’s Pre-College as well as the Fordham University. In the past, she served as a guest faculty at the Hunter College of New York, the Port Townsend Chamber Music Festival, and Boston University’s Tanglewood Institute. Ms. Tokunaga's private students range from absolute beginners to winners of international competitions, and she welcomes students from all ethnic and cultural backgrounds.

Ms. Tokunaga holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees as well as Artist Diploma from The Juilliard School. She loves cats, pyramids and the Legend of Zelda.

Ms. Tokunaga’s partner-in-crime is a Stefano Scarampella violin from 1900 and Nicolas Maire bow from circa 1850.