Sarah Ying Ma

Sarah Ma is currently pursuing a double-degree at Oberlin College and Conservatory with Sibbi Bernhardsson after transferring from The Juilliard School with Donald Weilerstein and Li Lin, and with Masao Kawasaki in the Pre-College Division. Sarah has performed internationally with Ensemble 212, New York Concerti Sinfonietta, the Accademia D’Archi Arrigoni, and more. She was featured in Show 393 on NPR’s “From the Top” and was a winner of the 2021 National YoungArts Competition. Sarah has attended the Heifetz International Music Institute, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and was the Dorothy Richard Starling fellow at Aspen Music Festival for three summers as a student of Robert Lipsett, Donald Weilerstein, and Paul Kantor. In 2019, she was a laureate of the Cooper International Competition sponsored by Florian Leonhard Fine Violins and the Anthony Quinn Foundation, and performed on an 1828 Vuillaume. She is grateful to have worked with Almita Vamos, Robert Levin, Aaron Rosand, and Sarah Chang, among others. Her chamber group, the Poiesis Quartet, recently completed several artistic residencies abroad while on tour in Uruguay. They recently received the Gold Medal and BIPOC Award at the prestigious 2023 St. Paul String Quartet Competition and Bronze at the Glass City Chamber Music Competition. They are laureates of the 2023 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, where they also won the Lift Every Voice Prize. Sarah is the recipient of the Oberlin Conservatory Dean’s Scholarship & John F. Oberlin Scholarship and is a 2023 Benjamin A. Gilman Scholar of the U.S. Department of State.