New Zealand-born violinist Geneva Lewis has forged a reputation as a musician of consummate artistry whose performances speak from and to the heart and who has been lauded for the “remarkable mastery of her instrument” (CVNC) and hailed as “clearly one to watch” (Musical America).

Named a BBC New Generation Artist (2022-24), Geneva is also the recipient of a 2022 Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award and a 2021 Avery Fisher Career Grant. She was also Grand Prize winner of the 2020 Concert Artists Guild Competition, winner of the Kronberg Academy’s Prince of Hesse Prize (2021), Musical America’s New Artist of the Month (June 2021), a Performance Today Young Artist in Residence and a YCAT Concordia Artist.

In August 2023, Geneva made her BBC Proms debut with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Jaime Martin; the 2023-24 season includes further performances with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and debuts with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Bordeaux Aquitaine, Kremerata Baltica (alongside Gidon Kremer in Schnittke’s Concerto Grosso No.1), as well as the Knoxville Symphony, Santa Rosa Symphony and Orquesta Filarmónica de Jalisco.

Geneva made her solo debut at age 11 with the Pasadena POPS, and has since gone on to perform with orchestras including the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia, North Carolina Symphony, Pasadena Symphony, Sarasota Orchestra, Kansas City Symphony, Austin Symphony and Arkansas Symphony, under conductors such as Hugh Wolff, Nicholas McGegan, Edwin Outwater, Grant Llewellyn, Giordano Bellincampi and Dirk Meyer.

Deeply passionate about chamber music, Geneva has had the pleasure of collaborating with prominent musicians such as Jonathan Biss, Glenn Dicterow, Miriam Fried, Kim Kashkashian, Gidon Kremer, Marcy Rosen, Sir András Schiff, and Mitsuko Uchida; she has performed in venues and festivals such as London’s Wigmore Hall, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Marlboro Music Festival, Kronberg Festival, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Ravinia and Chamberfest Cleveland.

An advocate of community engagement and music education, Geneva was selected for the New England Conservatory’s Community Performances and Partnerships Program’s Ensemble Fellowship, through which her string quartet created interactive educational programs for audiences throughout Boston. The quartet was also chosen for the Virginia Arts Festival Residency, during which they performed and presented masterclasses in elementary, middle, and high schools.

Geneva received her Artist Diploma from the New England Conservatory as the recipient of the Charlotte F. Rabb Presidential Scholarship, studying with Miriam Fried. Prior to that, she studied with Aimée Kreston at the Colburn School of Performing Arts. Past summers have taken her to the Marlboro Music Festival, Ravinia Steans Institute, Perlman Music Program’s Chamber Workshop, International Holland Music Sessions, Taos School of Music and the Heifetz International Music Institute. She is currently studying at Kronberg Academy with Professor Mihaela Martin.

Geneva currently performs on a composite violin by Giovanni Battista Guadagnini, c. 1776 generously on loan from a Charitable Trust.

Photo credit: Matthew Holler