A Conversation with Yo-Yo Ma 

Moderated by Jeffrey Brown, PBS NewsHour Correspondent 

Date: Sunday, Sept. 29
Time: 2 p.m. 
Location: Elliott Hall of Music 
Tickets currently unavailable. Please check closer to the event date for standby seating details.

Yo-Yo Ma 

Through personal anecdotes, thoughtful inquiry and musical interludes, Yo-Yo Ma explores how culture can help us all seek truth, build trust and act in service of one another. 

Yo-Yo Ma’s multifaceted career is testament to his belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works for cello, bringing communities together to explore culture’s role in society or engaging unexpected musical forms, Ma strives to foster connections that stimulate the imagination and reinforce our humanity.  

Among his many roles, Ma is a United Nations Messenger of Peace and the first artist ever appointed to the World Economic Forum’s board of trustees. His discography of more than 120 albums (including 19 Grammy Award winners) ranges from iconic renditions of the Western classical canon to recordings that defy categorization.   

Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris. He began to study cello with his father at age 4and three years later moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his cello studies at the Juilliard School before pursuing a liberal arts education at Harvard University.  

He has received numerous awards, including the Avery Fisher Prize (1978), the National Medal of the Arts (2001), the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2010), Kennedy Center Honors (2011), the Polar Music Prize (2012) and the Birgit Nilsson Prize (2022). He has performed for nine American presidents, most recently for President Biden’s inauguration. 

For more about Yo-Yo Ma, go here. 

Jeffrey Brown 

In his more than 30-year career with PBS NewsHour, Jeffrey Brown has served as co-anchor, studio moderator and field reporter on a wide range of national and international issues, with work taking him around the country and to many parts of the globe.  

As arts correspondent, Brown has profiled many of the world’s leading writers, musicians, actors and other artists.  

Among his signature works at NewsHour: a multiyear series, “Culture at Risk,” about threatened cultural heritage in the United States and abroad; the creation of the NewsHour’s online Art Beat; and hosting the monthly book club, Now Read This, a collaboration with The New York Times. 

Brown is author of a collection of poetry, titled “The News,” and serves as an advisor to the Sun Valley Writers Conference. His numerous honors include a Peabody Award and a News and Documentary Emmy Award.  

He earned a bachelor’s degree in classics from the University of California, Berkeley, a master’s degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, an honorary doctorate from Wesley College and attended the UC Berkeley School of Law. 

For more about Jeffrey Brown, go here.