Elizabeth Wilson

Elizabeth Wilson, cellist and writer on music, was born in London. At the age of seventeen she went to Moscow to study cello in Mstislav Rostropovich’s class at the Moscow Conservatoire.
On returning to London she pursued a career as performer and teacher, playing concerts throughout Europe. Her special interests in Russian and Soviet culture led her to devise programmes of words and music devoted to various aspects of twentieth century Russian music.

Wilson has been active in contemporary music, as a performer and acting as a project consultant, as well as writing articles and giving talks for festivals and symposiums in Europe and the USA.

For the last 16 years she has lived in Italy, near Torino where in 1995 she became a founder member of Xenia Ensemble, a group specialising in music by contemporary composers. Projects set up in Torino include an annual festival entitled “East .West a journey in the music of Today”.

Publications :

- Jacqueline du Pré (1998 Faber and Faber, London, and translations into Chinese and Korean)

- Shostakovich A Life Remembered, (1994 and in 2006 a revised and expanded edition Faber and Faber, London and Princeton University Press, USA, and in Russia for Kompozitor, St Petersburg, shortly to appear in Japan).

- Mstislav Rostropovich - Cellist, Teacher and Legend, ( 2007 , Faber and Faber London, Ivan Dee press Chicago).

- Trascrivere La vita intera, as editor of anthology of Shostakovich’s letters (2006 Il Saggiatore , Milano).