Leora Cohen

Leora Cohen is a postgraduate student and holds the Robert McFadzean Whyte Award at the Royal College of Music in London, studying violin with Ani Schnarch. She is also supported by Help Musicians UK and the Stephen Bell Trust. In 2020 Leora graduated from Newnham College, Cambridge University with a double first-class degree in music, holding the Anne Jemima Clough Prize for two consecutive years.

As a soloist, Leora has appeared with the Barnet Symphony Orchestra, the I Maestri Orchestra and numerous student orchestras and ensembles in London and Cambridge. Particular highlights include Beethoven’s Violin Concerto at West Road Concert Hall, 2020, and Lalo’s Symphonie Espagnole at St John’s Smith Square, 2016. She has also performed solo on Cam105, BBC Radio Cambridgeshire, at the Bowdoin International Music Festival, USA, in Duino, Italy and in Sinaia, Romania. In 2020 Leora was a finalist in the Sir Karl Jenkins Music Award competition.

Leora has played chamber music on BBC Radio 3, at Kings Place and at the Wigmore Hall and held an Instrumental Award for chamber music during her time at Cambridge. She is also a prominent orchestral player, having led all orchestras at the Junior Department of the RCM, for which she won numerous prizes, the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain in 2017, and the Cambridge University Orchestra in 2018. She led the NYO under the baton of John Wilson, Carlos Miguel Prieto and Thomas Ades at the BBC Proms, as well as on tour to France for Festival Berlioz. At Cambridge, she collaborated with musicians such as Sir Mark Elder, Tom Poster, Guy Johnson and John Butt. She has also had experience with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the London Sinfonietta, the English National Ballet and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

Leora currently leads the RCM Symphony Orchestra and was nominated by the RCM for the BBCSO professional mentoring scheme.