Joy Adams

 

Raised on a small farm in Spokane, WA, Joy Adams began playing the cello at age 15. Despite a string of classical adventures that included winning Musicfest Northwest, attending the Aspen Music Festival, soloing with the Spokane Symphony, earning a BM from the Eastman School of Music, and touring the country with the Selden String Quartet, Joy ultimately returned to her country roots and joined an old-time band called the Windsor Folk Family during her last year at Eastman. She was drawn to the Frost School of Music by the residency of Mark O'Connor and the Henry Mancini Institute, and is now a full-scholarship Mancini Fellow, working on her Doctorate at Frost and studying with Ross Harbaugh. She works closely with Mark O'Connor as part of the award-winning bluegrass trio Avocado Estate, and is currently writing and recording the cello books for O'Connor's string method. She teaches bluegrass songwriting at Frost, and is on the faculty of fiddle camps in Boston, Charleston, and Sandpoint, Idaho. She has made over a dozen concerto appearances and has shared the stage and/or recorded for artists such as Renee Fleming, Bobby McFerrin, Chic Correa, Terrance Blanchard, Pharrell Williams,  George Benson, Gloria Estefan, Edgar Meyer, Joshua Bell, and Mark O'Connor.