| Biography | Amy Tress started learning the violin aged 6 and three years later gained a place at the Royal College of Music Junior Department to study with Eszter Boda Katona. While at the RCM, she led the Chamber and Sinfonia Orchestras and won many prizes, including the Marjorie Humby Competition, Frida Dinn String Prize, Mary Gotch Leaders Prize, and the Ian Stoutzker Prize. In 2004 she gained her Diploma ABRSM and a place in the National Youth Orchestra. Amy also won many prizes in local competitions such as Sevenoaks Young Musician, Reading, Windsor and Maidenhead concerto competitions, and has given regular recitals, in such venues as St Martin in the Fields, London.
Amy continued her musical studies at Christ Church, Oxford, where she won an academic scholarship, music scholarship and Philomusica apprenticeship, and led the University Orchestra and Sinfonietta. While at Oxford she studied violin in London with Remus Azoitei. She graduated in 2010 with the highest first class degree in her year, winning the Gibbs Prize. Following this she won scholarships to all the major UK conservatoires for Postgraduate studies, and will be starting at the Royal College of Music in September with Maciej Rakowski.
In 2012, she attended the International Ravel Academy in France, to take part in masterclasses with Olivier Charlier, where she won the Musical Moments de Chalosse prize. Amys recent concerto performances include Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Korngold, Ravels Tzigane, and concertos for two violins by Bach and Schnittke. Also a keen chamber musician, Amy performs regularly with both the Aros Quartet and Mariette Trio, with whom she has taken part in masterclasses from the Maggini, Chilingirian, Allegri, and Belcea quartets, as well as Peter Cropper (Lindsay Quartet) and Miguel da Silva (Ysaÿe Quartet). As of 2013, she plays with the Britten Pears Orchestra and leads the Oxford Chamber Orchestra. |