Jessica Oddie - violin

Violinist Jessica Oddie has been praised by Limelight Magazine for leading “impassioned” performances that “crackled with electric energy.” She has appeared in recital across the United States, Europe, and Australasia, with performances at Lincoln Center and Le Poisson Rouge (New York), Teatro La Fenice (Venice), the Sydney Opera House, the Melbourne Recital Centre, and the Cité Internationale Universitaire de Paris.

Jessica returned to New Zealand in 2020 as Guest Assistant Concertmaster of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and was appointed Assistant Principal Second in 2022. In Australia, she has performed frequently as concertmaster for Victorian Opera and in principal roles at the Canberra International Music Festival, the Peninsula Summer Music Festival, and the Warren Chamber Music Festival. She has guest directed Omega Ensemble in Sydney and Inventi Ensemble in Melbourne. She also regularly collaborates with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Victoria, and the Australian Romantic & Classical Orchestra, with whom she has also appeared as soloist.

Her discography includes two chamber music albums for the Naxos and Tactus labels, featuring the premiere recording of twentieth-century Italian composer Gino Gorini’s chamber works. A founding member of the Elouan Quartet, Jessica will tour nationally with Chamber Music New Zealand in 2026. The quartet has been praised for its “marvellous clarity and balance” and “passionate performance” (FiveLines).

Festival appearances include the Venice Biennale, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Toronto Summer Music, and Fontainebleau, where she received the Chamber Music Prize. Other awards include first prize at the Carl Wendling Wettbewerb in Stuttgart, the Yale Friends of Music Award, and a DAAD Fellowship.

Following studies at The Juilliard School, Yale University, and the Yale School of Music, Jessica moved to Germany, where her quartet worked intensively with Gerhard Schulz of the Alban Berg Quartet. She later lived in New York City, teaching violin, chamber music, and orchestral studies at the City University of New York’s Brooklyn College. Currently a doctoral candidate at the CUNY Graduate Center, she is researching the interconnectedness of music and empathy - a theme that shapes both her artistry and pedagogy.