Gary Hoffman

Gary Hoffman (born 1956) is a Canadian and American cellist and academic teacher. A member of the Hoffman family of musicians, he is the son of conductor Irwin Hoffman and concert violinist Esther Glazer. He began performing as a child, making his concert debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1968 and his recital debut at Wigmore Hall in London in 1971. As a teenager he was a member of the Florida Gulf Coast Symphony and also performed with the orchestra as a soloist. In Florida he performed with his siblings and parents in the Hoffman String Quartet and the Hoffmann Family Players in the 1970s and 1980s.

In 1978 Hoffman graduated from the Indiana University School of Music (IUSM), and subsequently was a professor of cello at the IUSM from 1978 to 1985. In 1986 he became the first American to win the Rostropovich International Competition in Paris. After this, he maintained an international career, both as a soloist and a chamber musician. He has performed world premieres of cello concertos by multiple composers. He plays a cello built in 1662 by Nicolo Amati; it was previously played by Leonard Rose. He has made several recordings, including playing cello on the Grammy Award winning album Perpetual Motion (2001).

Hoffman holds a chair for cello at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and also teaches at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Brussels and the Kronberg Academy.