Biography

Niloofar Sohi is an Iranian musician who started her music career at the age of 8 and was enrolled in music school by the age of 12. She plays the viola and has studied with great teachers of Iranian and American backgrounds, such as Korey Konkol, Setareh Beheshti, and Taha Abedian. She ranked first among all students while studying music and performance at the University of Tehran. She was also distinguished as an Elite student in National Elite Foundation and won the first award from the University of Tehran to continue her studies for a master’s degree in Performing Arts. Niloofar is now studying DMA viola performance at the University of Minnesota.

Niloofar has the experience of working with various American and Iranian orchestras, including the Tehran Symphony Orchestra, Quad City Symphony Orchestra, and Mississippi Valley Orchestra. She has been part of international projects such as Le Vie Dell’Amicizia Ravenna-Tehran with Riccardo Muti (Italy), Internava Ensembles (Europe and Iran), and FeminEast festivals’ concerts (Sweden). She is a former violist of the Shahrzad Ensemble and has worked with great Iranian musicians such as Homayoun Shajarian, Pournazeri Brothers, and Houshyar Khayam.

In addition, She is an award winner of the National Youth Music Festival and Fajr festivals and has performed in many concerts in Asia, Europe, and the United States.
She is one of the co-founders of LyreIran, a collaborative focusing on promoting strings- related performance and education content. Holding free master classes and workshops with great pedagogues and musicians such as Kian Soltani, Katherine Murdock, Erika Raum, Hillary Herndon, Mark Fewer, and Steve Koh have been the primary focus of this group.

Furthermore, Niloofar has recorded different CDs, such as “The Other Side” by Houshyar Khayam, “Unspoken Grievances” by Amin Honarmand; and worked with numerous composers for recording projects like Peyman Yazdanian, Bardia Kiaras, and conductors, Shahrdad Rohani, Nasir Heydarian, Riccardo Muti and Mark Stevenson, Mark Russel Smith, and Osmo Vänskä.