From 1999 until its final season in 2013, Mr. Greensmith was a member of the world-renowned Tokyo String Quartet, giving over one hundred performances each year in the most prestigious international venues, including New York’s Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, London’s South Bank, Paris Chatelet, Berlin Philharmonie, Vienna Musikverein and Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He has collaborated with international artists such as Andras Schiff, Pinchas Zukerman, Leon Fleisher, Lynn Harrell, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Alicia de Larrocha and Emmanuel Ax.
Mr. Greensmith has given guest performances at prominent festivals worldwide. In North America he has performed at the Aspen Music Festival, Marlboro Music Festival, Music@Menlo, La Jolla Summerfest, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and the Ravinia Festival. He is a regular guest of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and will undertake a national tour with Paul Huang, Wu Han and Matthew Lipman in 2020. Internationally he has appeared at the Salzburg Festival in Austria, Edinburgh Festival in Scotland, Pacific Music Festival in Japan and the Hong Kong Arts Festival. As a soloist, Clive Greensmith has performed with the London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic, and the RAI Orchestra of Rome among others.
During a career spanning over twenty-five years, Mr. Greensmith has built up a catalogue of landmark recordings, most notably The Complete Beethoven String Quartet Cycle for Harmonia Mundi with the Tokyo String Quartet, Mozart’s ‘Prussian’ Quartets with the Tokyo String Quartet and Brahms Cello Sonatas with Boris Berman for Biddulph Recordings, and Clarinet Trios by Beethoven and Brahms with Jon Nakamatsu and Jon Manasse for Harmonia Mundi. Toccata Classics will release a live recording of his world premiere performance of the Pál Hermann Cello Concerto with Theodore Kuchar and the Lviv International Symphony Orchestra in the fall of 2018.
Mr. Greensmith studied at the Royal Northern College of Music in England with American cellist, Donald McCall, where he was the recipient of the prestigious Julius Isserlis Scholarship. He continued his studies at the Cologne Musikhochschule in Germany with Russian cellist Boris Pergamenschikow.
In 1987 he made his concerto debut with the London Symphony Orchestra and went on to be First Prize Winner in the Sergio Lorenzi chamber music competition in Trieste, Italy, and First Prize Winner in the Caltanisetta Duo competition. Most notably, he was a major prizewinner in the first ever “Premio Stradivari” held in Cremona, Italy in 1991.
Deeply committed to the mentoring and development of young musicians, Clive has enjoyed a long and distinguished teaching career. In addition to his fifteen-year residency with the Tokyo String Quartet at Yale University, Mr. Greensmith has served as a faculty member at the Yehudi Menuhin School and Royal Northern College of Music in England, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Manhattan School of Music and New York University. In 2013 he was appointed Co-Director of Chamber Music and Professor of Cello at the Colburn School in Los Angeles. Students of Mr. Greensmith have gone on to secure major positions in orchestras throughout the world and have won a number of prestigious awards. In 2015 he was a jury member at the 2015 Carl Nielsen Chamber Music Competition in Copenhagen.
Formerly the principal cellist of London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Mr. Greensmith is a founding member of the Montrose Trio with pianist Jon Kimura Parker and violinist Martin Beaver.
