Biography
Praised for his "musical honesty" by acclaimed Polish cellist, Kazimierz Michalik, Dr. Patrick Bellah has made it a personal priority to connect with his audiences on a personal level. Whether performing small, pop-up recitals in Fort Smith, Arkansas or solo and chamber performances across Europe, he considers authentic human connection to be the highest goal to which any artist can aspire.
Dr. Bellah has appeared as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral cellist internationally as a performer of early, traditional, and contemporary works. In 2011, he performed as a solo recitalist at the Kołobrzeg International Music Festival in Kołobrzeg, Poland and as a featured chamber musician at the Bay View International Music Festival in Petoskey, Michigan in 2013. In 2015, as part of the Northwest Arkansas String Quartet, he gave the world premiere of Florence Price's long-lost String Quartet in G major, which would later go on to be featured on American Public Media's Performance Today. During and immediately following the Covid-19 Pandemic, when collaborative music making was at a standstill, he embarked on a series of three solo recital programs that explore the full range of the cello's unaccompanied solo voice, including a historically informed performance of three Bach suites. These projects would be performed in Wiesbaden, Germany; Vienna, Austria; Harrogate, United Kingdom; and in multiple locations throughout his home state of Arkansas in the United States.
As an orchestral musician, Dr. Bellah has served as Principal Cellist of the Arkansas Philharmonic Orchestra and section cellist with the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, the Symphony of Northwest Arkansas, and the Texarkana Symphony Orchestra. Currently, he serves as cellist with the Madhouse Orchestra in Harrogate (UK), which he co-founded in 2025 with conductor, Fergus McAlpine. Notable artists with whom he has shared stages in this capacity include Vadim Gluzman, Cicely Parnas, Imre Palló, Alexander Markov, Amy Porter, Jon Kimura Parker, Jack Gibbons, and Zuill Bailey.
Dynamic and original compositions are also part of Dr. Bellah's musical output. His portfolio includes a cello quintet, completed in 2008; his String Quartet in A minor, completed in 2010; and, most notably, his own arrangement of The Star-Spangled Banner for 12 cellos, which was commissioned by the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2011. In a similar vein of artistic output, Dr. Bellah also has a unique history as a studio recording artist. His most notable work in this category stems from his collaboration with the indie band, Bear Colony, in 2007 on their album, We Came Here to Die, and with metalcore band, Norma Jean, on their 2013 album, Wrongdoers.
While creating and performing are certainly driving forces in Dr. Bellah's professional life, a passion of equal prominence is teaching. As a gifted young performer and pedagogue, he began his own private studio at the age of 17. From 2011 to 2015, he served as Instructor of Cello at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Arkansas and would later go on to teach as Instructor of Cello at Eastern Mennonite University and at Eastern Mennonite University's Preparatory Music Academy in Harrisonburg, Virginia from 2019 to 2022. Dr. Bellah is an accredited Suzuki teacher and maintains a private studio that boasts a student age range of 7-73 years of age. Coupled with Shinichi Suzuki's philosophy of teaching, he also incorporates techniques from masters in his own pedagogical lineage. He is a product of the studios of Tomasz Zieba, Stephen Gates, Felice Farrell, and Carl Donakowski.
Dr. Bellah holds a Bachelor of Music from Oklahoma City University, a Master of Music and a performance certificate from the University of Arkansas, and a Doctor of Musical Arts from James Madison University. He currently plays a 2015 cello made by the late Wayne Burak and a 2013 baroque cello by the also late Maciej Łacek. He and his family currently reside in Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, where he is active as a performer, teacher, and as COO of the aforementioned Madhouse Orchestra.