Cellist Nancy Bien received her BA in Music at California State University, Hayward, and her MA in Performance from the University of Iowa, where she studied cello with Charles Wendt, and chamber music with members of the Stradivari String Quartet.

After graduate school, she played and taught on the east coast for several years, spending summers playing in music festivals up and down the eastern seaboard, as well as doing a stint as Artist in Residence for the city of Baton Rouge. During that time she also studied with renowned cello pedagogues Fritz Maag, Thadeus Bryce, and Bob Newkirk.

She returned to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1980, and quickly embraced a busy freelance music career. She has been assistant principal cellist with the Marin Symphony for many years, is a member of the Berkeley Symphony, and performs regularly with many other Bay Area orchestras and chamber groups, including the Resonance Jazz Ensemble, a Bay Area jazz octet. Nancy joined the Temescal String Quartet in the Fall of 2015.