Born and raised in San Francisco, violinist Kenneth Renshaw came to international attention in 2012 after winning First Prize at the Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition in Beijing. He was also a prize winner in the Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition of Belgium, and First Prize recipient of the inaugural Manhattan International Concert Artists Competition.

He has since performed extensively around the world: as soloist with orchestras including the National Orchestra of Belgium, the Lithuanian National Orchestra, the Jenaer Philharmonie, the Staatskapelle Weimar, and the China Philharmonic, and recitals at notable venues such as the Auditorium du Louvre in Paris, the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festspiele in Germany, and the Menuhin Festival Gstaad. As a chamber musician he has collaborated with many esteemed artists: pianist Leon Fleisher, violinists Itzhak Perlman, Pamela Frank and Cho-Liang Lin, flautist Sir James Galway, and violist Kim Kashkashian, at festivals such as Caramoor, Ravinia, and Verbier.

Equally committed to teaching and mentoring the next generation of young musicians, Renshaw currently serves as Assistant Professor of Violin at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He formerly served as Teaching Assistant to Itzhak Perlman and Li Lin at the Juilliard School since 2018 . Under his guidance, students have won top prizes in the Yehudi Menuhin, Zhuhai, Leonid Kogan, Johansen, Michael Hill, Elmar Oliviera, Stulberg, and Louis Spohr International Competitions. Students from his private studio have won many regional and national competitions and acceptances to Juilliard, New England Conservatory, Colburn, Curtis, Music@Menlo, Morningside Music Bridge, and other notable institutions.

Renshaw has served as chamber music faculty at the Perlman Music Program’s Summer Music School and Sarasota Winter Residency, and the Crowden Music Center’s Chamber Music Workshop. In 2018 he participated in a cultural exchange residency in São Paulo Brazil teaching masterclasses and mentoring students from diverse backgrounds of the GURI Youth Orchestra programs, sponsored by Juilliard.

Committed to using technology to bring greater access to high level string teaching to a global audience, Renshaw served as a content editor and pedagogical consultant for Itzhak Perlman’s “Masterclass” series on masterclass.com.
Renshaw holds Bachelors and Masters degrees from the Juilliard School, where he studied with Itzhak Perlman, Li Lin, and Donald Weilerstein as recipient of the Kovner Fellowship. He is an alumnus of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Precollege Division, and the Crowden School.

Recently, Renshaw has cultivated an interest in pre-60s Romani jazz, becoming a member of the San Francisco-based musical collective Cantadora and the Hot Clams in 2020. He continues to perform with them to this day, most recently at the Cascais Jazz Festival in Portugal, and on their newly-formed performance series Music and Mariners in Sausalito CA. He hopes to bring the sense of connection, joy, and spontaneity of live improvisation to his work as a classical performer and educator.