Ramutė Kalnėnaitė studied cello at the M. K. Čiurlionis National School of Arts from 1964 to 1975, in the class of prof. Romanas Armonas. At the time, she won first prizes in international and republican competitions. She went on to study at the P. Tchaikovsky Conservatoire in Moscow from 1975 to 1980, where she obtained all the categories of qualification, including performer-soloist, pedagogue, chamber ensemble performer and orchestral soloist. At the request of the governmental institutions, she was appointed to work at the Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra, which was then under direction of maestro Sauliaus Sondeckis.
In 1980-1982, she continued her studies taking solo assistant-internship at the Moscow P. Tchaikovsky Conservatory, and studied with prof. Stefan Kalyanov, long time assistant of maestro Mstislav Rostropovich, for seven years in total. When returning to Lithuania in 1983, she was invited to work at the M. K. Čiurlionis National School of Arts, where she teaches cello, chamber music and works as an illustrator. In 1984, she won the first prize at the prestigious Interrepublican (now – International) Competition for Musicians and Artists in Riga.
Kalnėnaitė has performed in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, France, Switzerland, Belarus, Uzbekistan, the USA, and in the main halls of major Russian cities. She has performed solo concerts with the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra, Latvian National Symphony Orchestra, Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra, Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra, String Orchestra of the National M. K. Čiurlionis School of Arts, and with the Tashkent Conservatory Chamber Orchestra.
She has taken part in international and national music festivals in France and Lithuania (International Th. Mann Festival, Alternatyva, Christopher Summer Festival, Druskininkai Summer Festival with M. K. Čiurlionis, Northern Lithuania Music Festival in Biržai, International Summer Festival Olympus Musicus in Prague etc.). In 2001, Kalnėnaitė represented Lithuania at the International Mstislav Rostropovich Cello Festival in Riga, dedicated to the 800 years anniversary of the city, while maestro Rostropovich also performed solo and conducted the orchestra himself. In 2004–2005, she played Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme for a whole season in the American choreographer’s performances-concerts “Reflections”, a production of Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre.
She has recorded numerous pieces for the national broadcaster’s (LRT) foundations, and has performed chamber music programmes with the great Lithuanian and foreign musicians. She has played with such pianists, as Aušra Banaitytė, Gražina Ručytė-Landsbergienė, Yuri Gildiuk (Belarus), Jurgis Karnavičius, Leonid Dorfmann (Germany), Sonata Deveikytė-Zubovienė, Albina Šikšniūtė, Eugenijus Žarskus, Elena Stanevičiūtė, Sonata Alšauskaitė-Mikulė, Daiva Stulgytė, Vsevolod Dvorkin (Italy), Irina Nuzova (USA), Alexander Paley and many others. The artist has also worked with organists Leopoldas Digrys, Bernardas Vasiliauskas, Leonidas Melnikas, Renata Marcinkutė-Lesieur, Gediminas Kviklys, Jūratė Bundzaitė, and Jūratė Landsbergytė, viola players Harald Schoneweg (Germany), Jakov Zats (Italy), clarinetists Algirdas Budrys, Gennady Zabara (Belarus), violinists Roman Fedchuk (Czech Republic), Natasha Lipkina (USA), Alechandro Drago (Argentina), flautist Johannes Hustedt (Germany) and other renowned musicians.
She has received the Status of the Artist from the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture in 2005, and has been a member of the Lithuanian Musicians’ Union since its restoration in 1995. Since 2006, she has been a member of the Academia Quartet, widely performed with it in Lithuania, and in 2012 recorded an album in which – quintets with clarinet by W. A. Mozart and C. M. Weber. She is also an active methodologist, and in 2005 she prepared a cello programme for the String Section of the National M. K. Čiurlionis School of Arts, which was approved by the Lithuanian Ministry of Education and Science. She actively gave masterclasses for Lithuanian cello teachers and pupils together with expert teacher Romanas Armonas, have also conducted masterclasses in the Czech Republic, Latvia, Estonia and Belgium.
Kalnėnaitė is invited to work as a jury member and chair of national and international competitions. Her own students actively participate in competitions, honorably representing Lithuania, and perform with national and foreign both chamber and symphony orchestras, and those who have completed their studies in their homeland, successfully continue their studies at the universities in the USA, Finland, United Kingdom, Germany, and Ireland. Kalnėnaitė has been teaching at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre from 2012 until 2020, from 2018 she is a docent at the Music academy of the Lithuanian Vytautas Magnus University. In 2015, the cellist received acknowledgement letter by the President of the Republic of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė.