Elizabeth Skinner

Intrigued by the violin, Elizabeth Skinner began studying music at the age of nine in her hometown of Victoria, Canada. Since then, she has become an engaging and diverse performer, winning solo and chamber music awards in Canada and the United States.

An active soloist and chamber musician, Elizabeth has toured in Canada, the United States, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Japan, South Korea and China. She is a founding member of Trio Armonioso and Trio Émerillon, Associate Concertmaster of Pronto Musica Chamber Orchestra, and a member of Montreal’s cutting-edge classical string band, Collectif9.

As concertmaster, Elizabeth has enjoyed leadership roles with the McDuffie Center String Ensemble, the McGill Symphony Orchestra, and the McGill Contemporary Music Ensemble. She has had the privilege of working with conductors Ward Stare, Robert Spano, Eric Jacobson, Janos Sandor, Matthias Pintscher, Pablo Heras-Casado, Alan Gilbert and Alexis Hauser, and of performing with musicians such as Amy Schwartz Moretti, David Halen, Robert McDuffie, Daniel Phillips, Axel Strauss, Eric Nowlin, Marc Coppey, Kurt Muroki, Huw Watkins, Pedja Muzijevic, Steven Dann, Ernst Kovacic, Anssi Karttunen, and Johannes Moser.

Elizabeth graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance from the Robert McDuffie Center for Strings at Mercer University in Georgia, USA. She completed a Master of Music in Violin Performance at McGill University’s Schulich School of Music, and is continuing her studies there as a Doctorate of Music in Performance Studies candidate, under the instruction of Axel Strauss.

In 2015, Elizabeth was the winner of the Canadian Music Competition (19-30 years strings category) and the Jeunesses Musicales du Canada’s Peter Mendell Award. She won first prize in the Prix d’Europe competition strings category in 2016, as well as third prize in the overall competition, and the Guy Soucie prize for her interpretation of a Québécois work. In 2017 she was a recipient of the Sylva Gelber Music Foundation award. Most recently, she was a finalist in the Eckhardt-Gramatté National Music Competition (2018).