Stephanie Childress – Violin and Artistic Director
Stephanie is an 18-year-old musician from London. Born in May 1999, she started playing the piano at the age of 5 and violin at the age of six. She has just completed her second reading Music at St. John’s College, Cambridge University.
She joined the National Youth Orchestra in 2013 and was appointed its leader in 2015. She was invited by Alison Balsom to lead the Balsom Ensemble, a group of professional baroque musicians, on her tour of Germany in December 2016. As a soloist, she has been on BBC3 Radio. Among many prizes, she was also a string finalist in both the Royal Overseas League Competition and the BBC Young Musician Strings category 2016. She currently studies with Pieter Schoeman, the leader of the LPO, and plays a Venetian violin made by Francesco Gobetti.
Both musical theatre and opera have been two facets of the stage she has loved exploring, this lead her to coach the string section for the NYMT 2013 production of West Side Story, eventually becoming an Assistant Musical Director on their 2016 production of ‘Brass’ at the Hackney Empire. She is extremely passionate about opera having seen over a hundred productions. In January 2017, she conducted her first opera, Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia and conducted Lennox Berkeley’s ‘A Dinner Engagement’ in May 2017.
Stephanie is the Artistic Director for the Young Virtuosi Festival 2017.