At ease with the diverse musical styles of the last five centuries, Ms. Ou’s creative programming balances traditional European masterworks with more contemporary and eclectic ones. She has recorded three of the most beloved cello concerti by Haydn, Tchaikovsky, and Elgar, and premiered Taiwanese composer – Hsiao Tyzen’s Cello Concerto in Taipei, Taiwan. Her decade-long collaboration with Iranian composer Reza Vali has yielded numerous performances, premieres, and recordings of a dozen of his solo and string quartet works and his Cello Concerto: The Dervish and The Magus. Along with Hsiao, American composers Richard Toensing and Daniel Pinkham, have also dedicated works to her. Recent music performances have featured collaborations with crossover artists on mandolin, banjo, accordion, didgeridoo, erhu, pipa, and the Persian santoor. 

As a prize-winning recording artist, Carol’s discography includes solo and chamber music discs issued by Chi-Mei, Naxos, CRI, MSR, and Albany Records, many available on Spotify. Among her many recordings with the Carpe Diem String Quartet are Sergei Taneyev’s String Quartets (Vol. 4 & 5) on Naxos, and Reza Vali’s “The Book of Calligraphy” issued by Albany Records. Her Naxos recording of Walter Piston’s Chamber Music won the 2001 Chamber Music America’s Best Chamber Music CD award and her recording of Jeff Midkiff’s “Music for Mandolin & String Quartet” won the 2018 Global Music Awards gold medal.

A graduate of Yale, Ms Ou has taught at NEC, MIT, and NYU. She has served as Chair of Strings for NEC’s Adult Education and presently serves as the Chair of Chamber Music at NEC’s Preparatory School. Outside of her regular teaching, Carol travels internationally for cello and chamber music master classes on five continents, most recently in Hong Kong, Turkey, and Italy.