Yo-Yo Ma was born in France [1] cellist, virtuoso, orchestral composer ancestry Chinese, and winner of multiple Grammy Awards, the National Medal of Arts in 2001 [2] and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011. [3] He is one of the most famous cellists of modern times. [4] Yo-Yo Ma was born in Paris on October 7, 1955, China and the parents had a musical education. His mother, Marina Lu, was a singer, and his father, Hiao Tsiun-Ma, was a violinist and music teacher. His family moved to New York when he was five years old. At a very young age, Ma began studying violin and then viola, before finding his true calling, taking up the cello in 1960 at age four. According to Ma, his first choice was the double bass due to its large size, but compromised and took cello time. The child prodigy began performing before audiences at age five, and performed for Presidents John F. Kennedy and Dwight D. Eisenhower when he was seven. [5] [6] At eight, he appeared on American television with his sister, Yeou- Cheng Ma, in a concert conducted by Leonard Bernstein. For fifteen years old, the mother had graduated from Trinity School in New York and appeared as soloist with the Orchestra of Harvard Radcliffe, in a performance of Tchaikovsky Rococo Variations. Ma studied at the Juilliard School with Leonard Rose and briefly attended Columbia University, ultimately, before enrolling at Harvard University. Before entering Harvard, Ma played in the Marlboro Festival Orchestra under the direction of cellist and conductor Pablo Casals nonagenarian. Ma would ultimately spend four summers at the Marlboro Music Festival after meeting and falling in love with Mount Holyoke College sophomore and Jill hornor administrator his first summer festival there in 1972. [7] However, even before that time, the mother had constantly won fame and had performed with most major orchestras in the world. His recordings and performances of Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Suites recorded in 1983 and again in 1994-1997 are particularly acclaimed. He also had a good deal of chamber music, often with pianist Emanuel Ax, with whom he has a close friendship back from their days together at the Juilliard School of Music in New York. Ma received his bachelor's degree from Harvard University in 1976. [8] In 1991, he received an honorary doctorate from Harvard; Gregor Piatigorsky, Yo-Yo Ma, Jacqueline du Pré, William Pleeth, Pablo Casals