Charlie Thollander
San Francisco Bay Area Based Violinist
B.M UCLA 2020
M.M Boston U. 2022
Charlie Thollander
Performing Violinist
San Francisco, CA
De Fidibus
Intensos Resona Primum Testudine Nervos
Mercurius Fertur Sollicitasse Manu
Cum Raptas Pecudes Quaerentem Carmine Phoebum
Mollivit Crepitans Fila Canora Lyrae.
Flumina Rivorum Potuit
Celeresque Morari
Threicius Ventos Voce Poeta Sua;
Quin Comites Silvas Duxit Scopulosque, Ferasque
Dulcisonis Domuit Cantibus Ille Lyrae.
S.C.G
Get to know Charlie
Charlie Thollander is a born and raised violinist from San Francisco. In the year 2006, the 8 year old Charlie swore to himself that he would not quit violin until he had mastered it. The journey continues to this day.
Among Charlie's mentors, his last three teachers are alumni of the Saint Petersburg Conservatory and Moscow Conservatory, influencing him with the Russian style of violin playing. Charlie is also considered to be among the last "grand-students" of the 20th century violin soloist legend David Oistrakh through his previous professor Yuri Mazurkevich.
Charlie has experience competing in international competitions, with the last one in Salzberg, Austria. He has also performed in different concert halls including Davies Symphony Hall, Royce Hall, and Boston's Symphony Hall to name a few in the USA.
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When Charlie does not perform, he teaches. Since 2015, Charlie has had opportunities to work with kid and adult learners who are beginners, advanced players, and those returning to playing violin again. He regularly teaches at 3 music schools in the Bay Area.
Charlie believes that one of the greatest rewards of being a musician is the ability to build communities and to become part of one. Music fills the heart and soul in ways words and pictures cannot. Music is heard through vibrations using air as its medium. If music were its own substance, I like to imagine its analog to be the mythical Greek fifth element aether, also known as quintessence. Aether was believed to be the air that gods breathed. Perhaps "aether" describes the kind of air that breathes life into the divine, in the way music gives life to the air we breathe.
