Biography

Madeleine Mitchell has been described by The Times as ‘one of Britain's liveliest musical forces (and) foremost violinists'. Her performances in some 50 countries as soloist and chamber musician in a wide repertoire are frequently broadcast for television and radio including the BBC Proms, ABC (Australia), Bayerischer Rundfunk, S4C and Italian TV when she won the Palma d’Oro, praised both for her vibrant lyrical intensity and pioneering creativity. She won a Royal Philharmonic Society Enterprise Award in 2022 for her creative project linking art and music in film. Her latest album Violin Conversations, released by Naxos, has been widely acclaimed.

She has represented the UK in recitals, at the festival UKinNY at the Lincoln Center and for the Queen’s Jubilee in Rome - her ‘Century of British Music’ hosted by the British Ambassador. Recent engagements include BBC Radio 3, Grace Williams Violin Concerto and Vaughan Williams The Lark Ascending with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales broadcast live, tours of the USA (including Brahms Double concerto) and the release of a recording of the new work written for her by Robert Saxton which she premiered with Clare Hammond at the Three Choirs Festival. In the past few years Madeleine has performed Elgar Violin Concerto in Russia, given recitals in Singapore, Wigmore Hall London, Schoenberg Center Vienna, Dartington International Summer Festival, and judged the Western International Strings Competition in China. She’s been invited to Japan in 2024. 

Madeleine was engaged to direct a concert in London’s Southbank Centre’s International Chamber Music Season with her London Chamber Ensemble, in her Century of Music by British Women composers including her commission of a new piece by Errollyn Wallen CBE, replaced by a highly successful livestream at St John's Smith Square on International Women’s Day. Other recent successes include Mitchell's album of Grace Williams Chamber Music, all premiere recordings, with her London Chamber Ensemble - Guardian CD of the Week and no.2 in the Classical Charts, and Violin Muse - 7 world premiere recordings mainly of works written for her including her live recording with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales of the Violin Concerto by Guto Puw from the Vale of Glamorgan Festival.

Madeleine Mitchell has performed violin concertos with orchestras including the St Petersburg Philharmonic, Czech and Polish Radio Symphony, Wurttemberg and Munich Chamber, the Royal Philharmonic and other London orchestras, Kiev Radio & Television Orchestra, Orchestra de Bahia Brazil, for the BBC and with the Royal Oman Symphony for HM The Sultan of Oman. For the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee she returned to the Bath International Festival as soloist in the ‘Great Brits’ programme in Vaughan Williams The Lark Ascending, which she also performed as Canberra International Music Festival Artist-in-Residence and with Orchestra of the Swan in the Spring Sounds Festival. Her performance of Bruch Violin Concerto during the Edinburgh Festival was reviewed as ‘totally bewitching. She has a full rich tone which sang strongly.’ She devised a unique ‘concerto’ for violin and choir, with new works by Jonathan Harvey, Thierry Pecou and Roxanna Panufnik, supported by Arts Council England in several festivals. 

Mitchell’s acclaimed discography for which she has been nominated for a Grammy and BBC Music Awards, includes In Sunlight: Pieces for Madeleine Mitchell by MacMillan, Nyman and other well known UK composers, FiddleSticks - Lou Harrison Violin Concerto with Percussion Orchestra and new companion pieces (which she performed in Symphony Hall International Series); the popular Violin Songs - Classic FM’s featured CD, British Treasures - early 20th century romantic violin sonatas, two albums for Naxos of music by Alwyn and Howard Blake (with the composer as pianist), Hummel violin sonatas, Bridge chamber music and the widely recommended Messiaen Quartet for the End of Time with Joanna MacGregor. Madeleine’s Linn recording of MacMillan Motet with solo violin and choir was BBC Music’s CD of the Month. 

Madeleine Mitchell is well known for her recitals with her imaginative programming and eloquent introductions, described by The Herald as ‘a violinist in a million’ after a recital in Glasgow. Mitchell has given recitals at Sydney Opera House, Seoul Center for the Arts and Hong Kong - part of a 3 month world tour supported by the British Council, played at many international festivals and frequently in London. She represented Britain with recitals for the centenary of Entente Cordiale and Kuwait ‘Great British Week’ alongside Sir John Major.

Madeleine Mitchell won the GBSF award for her recitals with Japanese pianist Noriko Ogawa and she has collaborated with many outstanding artists including Norbert Brainin (Amadeus Quartet) for his 80th birthday at Wigmore Hall. She regularly tours the US and other recent recitals have included the Aigues-Mortes festival and Rome (broadcast by Radio CEMAT). Future projects include being invited to join www.salonmusical.co.uk in a theatrical show re-creating the Paris and Venetian salons in costume. 

A highly creative personality, Madeleine Mitchell devised the Red Violin Festival under Lord Menuhin's patronage, the first international, eclectic celebration of the fiddle across the arts, held throughout Cardiff for which she was shortlisted for European Women of Achievement and Creative Briton Awards www.redviolin.co.uk. She will be directing the Red Violin next throughout Leeds in October 2024. At the start of her career Madeleine was the violinist/violist in Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’s seminal group, The Fires of London. 

Madeleine Mitchell won the Tagore Gold Medal as Foundation Scholar at the Royal College of Music where she is a Professor. As Fulbright/ITT Fellow she was awarded a master's degree in New York studying with Dorothy DeLay, Donald Weilerstein and Sylvia Rosenberg (as her Graduate Assistant) at the Eastman and Juilliard schools. She gives master classes worldwide and is on the faculty of the Orfeo International Music Festival in the Italian Alps and the international LMFL courses. Madeleine plays on an 1839 Rocca violin made in Turin. She was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2000.

Not to be used as concert biography. Please contact mlmfrsa@aol.com