Born in Singapore in 2000, Carlo Lay began playing the cello at an early age. From 2013 to 2018, he was a young student with Christian Brunnert at the University of Music and Dance in Cologne. He completed his bachelor's degree with Leonid Gorokhov at the Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media. He studies with Danjulo Ishizaka at the University of the Arts Berlin and with Sol Gabetta at the Music Academy Basel as part of their Class d'Excellence.

Carlo received artistic inspiration from Igor Levit, Daniel Hope, Donald Weilerstein, Ivan Monighetti, Frans Helmerson, Jens Peter Maintz, Wolfgang Boettcher, Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt and Arto Noras, among others. He is a scholarship holder of the International Music Academy in Liechtenstein and takes part in the intensive weeks and activities that take place there.

Carlo has won national and international competitions, including the "Flame Competition" in Paris and the "Beethoven Bonnensis Competition" and was awarded the "Promotional Prize of the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival". In 2019, Carlo founded the Avin Trio together with violinist Valerie Schweighofer and pianist Josefa Schmidt. Among other things, the trio has won prizes at the “Anton Rubinstein Competition for Chamber Music” and has received grants from the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation and the Elsa Wera Arnold Foundation.

Carlo has given concerts as a soloist with the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn, the WDR Orchestra, the New Westphalia Philharmonic and has given concerts at numerous festivals, including the Beethoven Festival Bonn, Brussels Cello Festival, International Mendelssohn Festival and the Eight Bridges Festival. Concert tours as a soloist and chamber musician have taken him to Europe, Asia and the USA.

At the Sommerliche Musiktage Hitzacker 2021, the Avin Trio was also part of a virtual reality video production, which was nominated for an OPUS Klassik in 2022.

Carlo Lay is a scholarship holder of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben, the Episcopal Cusanuswerk scholarship, the Janssen Foundation and the Villa Musica Rheinland-Pfalz.

He plays a cello by Angelo Toppani from 1733, which was made available to him by the ANDARTA Foundation.