Elise Winters is an accomplished teacher and teacher trainer whose students have gone on to win numerous awards and honors including the Enkor International Violin Competition. She has spent more than a decade researching best practices in teaching violin to young children, synthesizing her work in Kaleidoscopes for Violin, which integrates Suzuki principles with other important elements including music literacy. She has been a returning presenter at the American String Teachers’ Association national conference, and her Kaleidoscopes Book 1 and Book 2 Teacher Courses have received rave reviews from by teachers from all over the United States and Great Britain.

Elise’s violin training includes internationally renowned Suzuki teacher Ronda Cole and Elisabeth Adkins, associate concertmaster of the National Symphony Orchestra. She was a finalist in the National Symphony Young Artists Competition, where she performed at the Kennedy Center. She is an alumna of Interlochen Summer Music Festival, Encore School for Strings (where she studied with Renata Artman Knific) and Meadowmount, where she performed for Josef Gingold, and performed the Glazunov Violin Concerto in recital.

Elise is a graduate summa cum laude of Rice University, where she studied Music and English Literature. She became a member of the Austin Symphony Orchestra in 1996 and the Austin Lyric Opera in 1998. She holds a Master of Social Work from the University of Texas, where she was a Beinecke Memorial Scholar and Presidential Scholar.

An expressive player with a powerful sound and dynamic leadership, Elise been featured as a soloist with organizations including Salon Concerts, Victoria Bach Festival, Austin Chamber Music Center, Chamber Soloists of Austin, and La Follia. She performed with the principals of the Austin Symphony as second violinist of the Austin String Quartet for six years.

Elise served as Assistant Education Director of CHAMPS (Chamber Music in Public Schools) for two years, has been on faculty at the Austin Chamber Music Center for 18 years, and has twice co-coordinated their summer chamber music workshop. She completed Kodaly Levels I, II and III at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and has received her Suzuki training (Books 1-6) and additional coursework from Ronda Cole, Doris Preucil, Ed Kreitman, Charles Krigbaum, Judy Bossuat-Gallic, Cathy Lee, Nancy Lockin, Brian Lewis, and Marilyn O’Boyle.

Elise’s students’ achievements include highest honors in the American Protégé Violin Concerto Competition, Golden Classical Music Awards, Grand Prize Virtuoso Competition, ENKOR International Music Competition, Great Composers Competitions’ Master of Violin Concertos, Asian American Festival Competition; ADMTA state competition, and first violinist with the Austin Chamber Music Center’s Honors Quartet. Her students have gone on to music schools including Texas State University, University of North Texas, Boston Conservatory, New England Conservatory, and Yale University School of Music, and perform with the Boston Philharmonia, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Verbier Festival Orchestra, and the Pacific Symphony.