CELLIST • educator • Founder
Sonya Matoussova
A performing cellist, devoted educator, and the founder of Cello Realm.
ABOUT SONYA
Musician. Teacher. Community Builder.
Sonya Matoussova is a professional cellist based in Gatineau, QC. She performs regularly with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, appears as a soloist with orchestras across North America, and has performed chamber music on stages in Canada, the United States, Brazil, Italy, Poland, Romania, the Netherlands, and Armenia.
She is also the founder of Cello Realm and its core program, The Academy — a conservatory-inspired learning environment designed specifically for adult cello students.
Her work as an educator is rooted in a simple conviction: that adult learners deserve the same quality of instruction, community, and musical opportunity as anyone else.
AS A PERFORMER
A life in music
Sonya holds degrees from the University of Montreal (class of Yuli Turovsky) and the University of Houston (class of Vagram Saradjian). She has won top prizes at international competitions, including the Schlern International Competition in Italy and the Canadian Music Competition.
She has appeared as soloist with the Mercury Chamber Orchestra, the Houston Hwamei Chamber Orchestra, the Symphony of Southeast Texas, and the “Dwóch Cesarzy” Festival Orchestra. Her chamber music collaborations have taken her across three continents.
Today, she performs regularly with the National Arts Centre Orchestra alongside an active schedule of teaching, recording, and community leadership.
NAC Orchestra
PERFORMER
10+ Years
TEACHING ADULTS
8 Countries
PERFORMED
2 Int’l Prizes
COMPETITION AWARDS
as an educator
How The Academy came to be
Teaching has been woven into Sonya’s life for as long as she can remember — from coaching gymnastics as a teenager, to stepping in for her university professor at a moment’s notice, to teaching yoga classes on Zoom right up until the birth of her daughter, Raya.
When she began building her cello teaching practice more than a decade ago, she didn’t set out to create an online program. But something kept happening: inquiry after inquiry from adult students, each one eager to study seriously and grow meaningfully on the instrument. One student led to another, and Sonya found herself discovering something she hadn’t anticipated — that working with adult learners brought her a particular kind of fulfillment.
Adults, she found, bring a depth of intention to their practice that is its own reward to teach. They show up with curiosity, dedication, and a genuine love of music. And yet so few serious, structured learning spaces had been built with them in mind.
The Academy grew out of that gap — and out of that joy.
BEYOND THE INSTRUMENT
Sonya is also a certified teacher of the Yoga Better style and the creator of the Yoga Better for String Players online class series — a reflection of her commitment to musicians’ health and sustainable playing. She lives in Gatineau with her family, balancing an active performing career with her work as an educator and community founder. Her daughter, Raya, has a habit of showing up in her newsletters.
Study with Sonya in the Academy
A conservatory-inspired program for adult cello students. Enrollment is open and ongoing.