Abby Swidler is a performer, composer, and educator. A violinist, violist, and vocalist, Abby is a passionate collaborator with a versatile performance career.

She has performed across North America, Central America, and Europe and both performs her own compositions and is a thoughtful and imaginative interpreter of the music of others.  She frequently performs with: Tredici Bacci, NYC’s Ennio Morricone inspired Italian Film Score Band; Phoenix Ensemble, Boston’s innovative orchestra;  and Harvard Baroque Chamber Orchestra, Harvard University’s Early Music ensemble. She performs her own compositions with a variety of ensembles in concert spaces and also in collaboration with film, dance, and theater.

As a songwriter and composer, Abby’s music is filled with vivid imagery, striking melodies, spaciousness, and has been described as “astonishingly subtle” by Boston’s Trill Picks and “hypnotic” by The Boston Compass.  She was an Artist in Residence at Banff Centre for the Arts in November, 2014, and a featured performer at Boston’s 2015 Times Two Series. In spring of 2016, she composed and recorded the score for the film Butte Bangs by filmmaker, Jeff Verlanic.  New World Symphony musicians premiered her piece “Dust Beneath,” for string quintet and two voices in March of 2017 as part of the O Miami Poetry Festival. She released a self-titled EP of songs in 2015 and has an instrumental album in the works for 2018.

She has had the privilege to perform, record, and collaborate with great artists such as Carla Kihlstedt, Mirah, Greg Saunier, Jherek Bischoff, Anthony Coleman, Giselle Ty, Bent Knee, Patchtax, Courtney Swain, Darlene Love, Marin Orlosky-Randow, The California Guitar Trio, Tony Levin, Discovery Ensemble, and The Eastman Broadband, and has played in over 25 professional studio albums ranging from contemporary classical to pop/rock/experimental.

She received a B.M. in Violin Performance from Eastman School of Music and an M.M. in Contemporary Improvisation from The New England Conservatory.  Originally from Missoula, MT, she currently lives in Boston, MA.