Nathan Slobodkin cello, Boston 2016

A native of Ann Arbor, Michigan, Nathan Slobodkin has enjoyed more than 40 years experience in the musical instrument field. His career has included an internship in the musical instrument collection of the Smithsonian Institution, five years of building instruments in the W. H. Lee workshop in Chicago, two years on the restoration staff of Jacques Français, Rare Violins in New York, and a twelve-year collaboration with Reuning & Son Violins in Boston, producing more than 80 cellos modeled after the famous Ex-Messeus Guarneri del Gesù. He has provided services for many of the top violin shops around the United States, and his instruments have been sold in Europe, Asia, and across North America.

Slobodkin was awarded a Certificate of Merit for workmanship by the Violin Society of America in 1996 and a second prize for violin making at the Art of Sound International Violin Making Competition in 2014. He has attended the Violin Society of America’s Violin Making Workshops held annually at Oberlin College in Ohio and has operated his own business in Bangor, Maine since 1993.