Fiji-born Melbourne violinist Wilma Smith has been announced as the recipient of the 2025 Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Award.

The prize acknowledges outstanding achievements of a musician on the Australian musical landscape.

Wilma Smith. Photo © Agatha Yim/ Polyphonic Pictures.

Smith was born in Fiji and raised in Auckland. After training at Auckland University she went on to study at Boston’s New England Conservatory, where she founded the Lydian String Quartet, and performed with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Harvard Chamber Orchestra, amongst other groups.

Returning to New Zealand in 1987, Smith formed the New Zealand String Quartet and was appointed Concertmaster of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra in 1993, where she was later awarded the title of Concertmaster Emeritus.

Smith held the position of Concertmaster with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra between 2003–2014 under Chief Conductor Andrew Davis. She has also appeared as Guest Concertmaster for the Sydney, Adelaide, Tasmanian and West Australian Symphony Orchestras.

Smith joined the Flinders Quartet as Second Violin in 2019, and since 2016, she has been Musica Viva Australia’s Artistic Director of Competitions where she manages the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition and the Strike A Chord initiative...