2Cellos

Background

Hauser is from Pula, Croatia, and Šulić is from Maribor, Slovenia (born to a Croatian father and Slovenian mother). They met at a master class in Pula while still in their teens. They were both educated at the Academy of Music in Zagreb. Later on, Šulić studied in Vienna and they both studied in the UK (Šulić at London's Royal Academy of Music and Hauser at Trinity College of Music, now Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music in London and then at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester).

The duo rose to fame in 2011 after their cover of "Smooth Criminal" became a hit on YouTube, receiving over three million views in the first two weeks and almost 43 million views as of April 2021. features Šulić and Hauser facing off alone in a large ballroom littered with chairs, playing Jackson's tune. Before they became partners, the two cellists were sometimes considered rivals, competing against each other in music competitions.

Career

2Cellos signed to record with Sony Masterworks, and finished recording their first album in May 2011, which carried the Menart Records label in Croatia. Released on 19 July 2011, their eponymous debut album includes covers of songs by U2, Guns N' Roses, Nine Inch Nails, Sting, Coldplay, Nirvana, Muse, and Kings of Leon. The album also features a cello version of Michael Jackson's "Human Nature." The duo said that they chose songs that could be arranged as covers playable on just two cellos. In anticipation of the release, 2Cellos released their second single, "Welcome to the Jungle," a cover of the Guns N' Roses song of the same name.

Elton John asked the duo to appear with him on his 2011 summer tour, which began in Cardiff, Wales on 8 June. John personally called Šulić and said that he had watched the "Smooth Criminal" video and wanted 2Cellos to participate in his thirty-city tour. The two had previously performed on The Ellen DeGeneres Show of 25 April 2011. 2Cellos also performed at the 2011 iTunes Festival in London. They went on to perform internationally with Elton John and his band for five years, including hundreds of performances at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. They appear in The Million Dollar Piano movie filmed at the Colosseum in 2012 and on the 2013 album, The Diving Board.

The duo performed an arrangement of "Smooth Criminal" in the third season of the television show Glee. The episode in which they appeared, titled "Michael", aired on 31 January 2012, and was the first time that the series highlighted instrumental musicians. The scene featuring "Smooth Criminal" was set up similarly to 2Cellos' original music video for the song. On 4 June 2012 2Cellos performed with Elton John at the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Concert at Buckingham Palace. On 12 June 2012, 2Cellos performed in front of a full Arena Zagreb audience. The concert was filmed for DVD: Live at Arena Zagreb.

Although the two usually record covers of rock songs, Šulić and Hauser said they still play with orchestras and will not abandon playing classical music. The cellists said they would someday like to go on tour with both a classical and a contemporary orchestra, a hope that was fulfilled in part during their tour for the album Score. Their second studio album, entitled In2ition, came out early in 2013, and featured new twists on a diverse range of classic tracks with a few surprise vocal and instrumental duet partners including Elton John, Lang Lang, Naya Rivera, Steve Vai, Sky Ferreira and Zucchero. The album was produced by Bob Ezrin.

Other tracks include covers of AC/DC's "Highway to Hell" featuring Vai, Coldplay's "Clocks" featuring Lang Lang, Muse's "Supermassive Black Hole" featuring Rivera, an Italian version of "The Book of Love" by The Magnetic Fields entitled "Il Libro Dell'Amore" featuring Zucchero, Karl Jenkins' "Benedictus", and "Oh Well" featuring Sir Elton.

In July 2013, they filmed a commercial for the Japanese mobile phone company Docomo. Their album In2ition debuted on the Japanese Albums Chart, in August 2013 at number 1. Since then, they have done commercials for the US National Football League Thursday Night Football https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPs9TEhnTxQ, for 1906 Reerva Especial http://www.mundohr.com/11243-2/ and they have done several print campaigns for the Italian designer, s.Oliver.

As a part of their world tour with Elton John, including concerts in North America, Europe and Asia, 2Cellos performed at Madison Square Garden two days in a row, in December 2013. In March 2014, they had a solo Japanese tour.

In 2015, 2Cellos released their third album, Celloverse, which they also co-produced. The album contains a diverse array of renditions including AC/DC's "Thunderstruck", Avicii's "Wake Me Up", Michael Jackson's "They Don't Care About Us", Hans Zimmerʼs "Mombasa" (from Inception), and an original work titled Celloverse, among numerous other covers.

2Cellos has used YouTube to reach out to their audience, posting videos of notable live performances, including Arena Zagreb (2012), Arena Pula (2013), EXIT Festival (2014), and their fifth anniversary concert at Arena di Verona (2016) in Italy. In February 2014, the duo published their rendition of AC/DC's "Thunderstruck" to YouTube. The video depicts the duo playing before a Baroque audience, which soon finds out that the song is anything but classical. The video went viral at the beginning of March, gathering 10 million views in the first two weeks. As of March 2021, the video has garnered over 200 million views.

As Šulić told The Sydney Morning Herald, "we love AC/DC as much as Bach." Hauser added, "both (AC/DC and Bach) are simple and convincing in what they do."

In 2017, Šulić and Hauser released their fourth album, Score, recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra, which included a wide array of television and film music. To mark the album's release, 2Cellos released their official YouTube video for Game of Thrones Medley, which garnered over 1 million views in two days.

On 26 May 2018, 2Cellos performed the UEFA Champions League Anthem ahead of the 2018 UEFA Champions League Final between Real Madrid and Liverpool. That same year, they released their fifth album, Let There be Cello. In November 2022, they performed at the Cairo International Film Festival.

The Dedicated World Tour was 2Cellos' farewell tour. Šulić cited focusing on his family as a reason for formally ending his involvement with 2Cellos, while Hauser will continue on with solo work.

Discography

Main article: 2Cellos discography

• 2Cellos (2011, Sony Masterworks)
• In2ition (2013, Sony Masterworks)
• Celloverse (2015, Sony Masterworks)
• Score (2017, Sony Masterworks)
• Let There Be Cello (2018, Sony Masterworks)
• Dedicated (2021, Sony Masterworks)

Tours

• International Tours in Europe and the US and Canada 2013
• International Tours in Japan, Australia, Europe and Russia 2014
• • International Tours in Australia, the US and Canada, Europe, Japan and other Asian countries, Latin America and Russia* 2015
• CELLOVERSE tour: US and Canada, Europe, Latin America and Australia 2016
• The Score World Tour (2017) with orchestral accompaniment
• Let There Be Cello (tour) (2019) (their first Arena tour)
• Dedicated World Tour (2022)

Awards

Porin

Main article: Porin (music award)

Japan Gold Disc Award

Main article: Japan Gold Disc Award

MTV Europe Music Awards

Main article: MTV Europe Music Awards

''Večernjak'''s Rose

Main article: Večernji list

Orders

Main article: Orders, decorations, and medals of Croatia

References

References

1. [http://www.2cellos.com/biography/ 2Cellos biography] {{Webarchive. link. (22 December 2016 "Young Croatian and Slovenian cellists Stjepan Hauser, together known as 2Cellos...")
2. "2Cellos | Yamaha Artists".
3. (10 May 2019). "CAA Signs 2Cellos".
4. Koruga, Igor. (14 April 2011). "Hrvatski violončelisti potpisali ugovor sa Sony Music Entertainmentom". [[Nacional (weekly).
5. (28 January 2014). "Glee Season 18: Sean and Catherine's Wedding".
6. (February 2020). "Luka Šulić otkriva kako mu je bez Hausera i progovara o svojim manama: 'Znam jako burno i divlje reagrati'".
7. "Luka Sulic - Official Website".
8. Videtti, Giuseppe. (6 June 2011). "Il violoncello da favola di Luka e Stjepan da YouTube ai concerti di Elton John". [[Gruppo Editoriale L'Espresso]].
9. (19 May 2011). "Slovenian, Croatian Cellists Make Breakthrough on YouTube". [[Slovenian Press Agency]].
10. Cervera, Marty. (7 June 2011). "Los chelos del pop". Grupo Zeta.
11. (9 May 2011). "Mariborski čelist bo z Eltonom Johnom nastopil tudi v Izoli". MMC RTV Slovenija.
12. (16 April 2011). "2Cellos Luka Šulic & Stjepan Hausar izdaju album". MTV.
13. D'Andrea, Niki. (6 June 2011). ""Welcome to the Jungle," As Performed by 2Cellos". Phoenix New Times, LLC.
14. Došen, Vanja. (12 April 2011). "Telefonski poziv koji im je promijenio život". [[Europapress Holding]].
15. Hartsell, Carol. (8 June 2011). "2Cellos Covers 'Welcome to the Jungle'". TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc..
16. (13 April 2011). "2Cellos snimaju za Sony i sviraju s Eltonom Johnom". [[T-Hrvatski Telekom.
17. (19 April 2011). "Sony Masterworks Signs Viral Internet Sensation 2Cellos". Wisdom Digital Media.
18. Vugrinec, Goran. (25 April 2011). "Vatreni duet nastupio u showu Ellen DeGeneres: Stjepan od žestine slomio gudalo!". Europapress Holding.
19. Keck, William. (6 January 2012). "Keck's Exclusives: More Details on ''Glee''{{'s}} Salute to Michael Jackson". TV Guide Online Holdings, LLC.
20. Jurgensen, John. (13 January 2012). "The Cello Shredders". Dow Jones & Company, Inc..
21. (5 October 2012). "The making of the new album IN2ITION". 2Cellos Official Web Site.
22. (18 July 2013). "Pogledajte 2Cellos u reklami japanskog mobilnog operatera". Gloria.
23. (19–25 August 2013). "洋楽アルバム 週間ランキング-ORICON STYLE ランキング". [[Oricon]].
24. (4 December 2013). "2Cellos su osvojili Madison Square Garden u New Yorku". [[24sata (Croatia).
25. (3 December 2013). "2Cellos u Madison Square Gardenu". Radio Pula.
26. "2Cellos Create A New Dimension With Celloverse Album Available January 27, 2015".
27. (25 March 2014). "Naši dečki ruše rekorde – na Youtubeu imaju više 10 mil. pogleda!". Dnevnik.hr.
28. "2Cellos offer fresh takes on old favorites".
29. (18 May 2018). "2Cellos to perform UEFA Champions League anthem in Kyiv".
30. (November 2022). "Trendy Artist of the Week: Maroon 5, Max Pezzali, The Vamps, Elton John, 2Cellos". Concerty.com News.
31. (2022-06-01). "The Long Goodbye Of 2CELLOS: The Duo Who Revolutionised Cello As An Instrument".
32. Graff, Gary. (2022-03-25). "Groundbreaking 2Cellos duo says farewell with final tour".
33. (30 May 2013). "2Cellos primili osvojene Porine". dulist.hr.
34. (13 July 2013). "Foto: 2Cellos snimili novi spot za pjesmu Technical Difficulties". Net.hr.
35. "Objavljene nominacije za 21. Porin". Porin.
36. (28 February 2014). "The Japan Gold Disc Award 2014/Instrumental Album of the Year". [[Recording Industry Association of Japan.
37. "The Japan Gold Disc Award 2014/Song of the Year by Download". [[Recording Industry Association of Japan.
38. (18 September 2015). "2Cellos i Hladno pivo među nominiranima za MTV Best Adria Act!". [[Glas Slavonije]].
39. (21 March 2014). "Dodijeljene Večernjakove ruže, pogledajte tko su dobitnici". [[Večernji list]].
40. (26 April 2011). "2Cellos - YouTube". YouTube}} All views of all videos posted of solely "Smooth Criminal" (i.e. excluding album videos that include Smooth Criminal as a song) - the number quoted by this source {{cite news.