As an educator, it is an honour and privilege to coach motivated, advanced violinists from all around the world. Nothing gives me greater satisfaction than helping passionate violinists achieve their musical goals and succeed as musicians.

The day the ¼ size and ½ size violins arrived in the mail from my uncle in Taiwan meant that my sister, brother, and I were adding ‘violin lessons’ to our after-school explorations: namely Little League, soccer, art classes, Girl Guides, in addition to our piano lessons.

(What was this thing called anyway? It’s so shiny. And the strings sound kind of whiny…)

Group sibling lessons with a local fiddler in our small Newfoundland town transformed into private Suzuki lessons after our family moved to the ‘Big City’ of St. John’s (population 96,000 then). We were the only Kuos in the entire phone book, as well as on the entire island of Newfoundland! (And we still are!)

Lessons in both violin and piano were wedged into my weekly schedule alongside school homework and activities: science fair projects, public speaking contests, and my brief stint as Student Council President in 9th Grade.

My reputation as a ‘pianist first’ and a ‘violinist second’ was starting to evolve into me becoming a ‘double threat’.

My teachers began to encourage me to choose between the two. 

I was almost 15 when I participated in the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, and it was during this summer that I made the decision to be a 'violinist'.

My parents did not allow me to quit piano lessons until high school graduation, however.

I’m glad they insisted on this!

At 15, I was in THE high school for music in the city of St. John’s. Holy Heart of Mary had a string orchestra, multiple choirs… and practice rooms which I was permitted to retreat to whenever my teachers allowed me to skip class to practice.

I became the Chamber Choir’s pitch pipe (because of my perfect pitch) as well as their pianist. (Holy Heart’s choirs went on to international accolades - but certainly not because of my croaky pitch pipe or piano skills.)

I was also the concertmaster of Holy Heart’s string orchestra. Music was definitely my thing. I even arranged an SATB arrangement of the Christmas carol Carol of the Bells, which the choir chose to perform multiple times.

I still remember the music room’s graveyard of neckless fiddles, broken scrolls, and other horrendous instrument cadavers found in the music room’s locker space.

And I also remember a sign taped to one of the practice room walls:

This has deeply influenced my Practice Ninja philosophy to this day!

It was during these high school years that my first nickname was created: Violynn.

I did the first year of my Bachelor of Music degree at Memorial University of Newfoundland with Dr. Nancy Dahn before I transferred my academic credits to the University of Toronto to study with the great Hungarian-Israeli/turned Canadian pedagogue Lorand Fenyves.

I still have Mr. Fenyves’ photo on my piano to this day; he is the 'master' who listens to my practice sessions.

I completed three degrees at the University of Toronto: Bachelor and Master of Music, as well as my Doctor of Musical Arts (with Erika Raum and Mayumi Seiler). 

In the second year of my Master's degree, I found myself suddenly realizing that I needed to bring home a paycheque if I wanted to “survive” in the world as a violinist.

It was approximately my third audition when I decided to take the audition (for experience) for the National Ballet of Canada Orchestra's Section Violin position.

The Assistant Concertmaster audition was the week before the Section Violin audition and so, in wanting to give myself a dress rehearsal for the Section Violin audition, I decided to take both auditions.  

I won the Assistant Concertmaster audition. My ‘own selection’ piece was Bach Chaconne. (What was I thinking?)

I was still a full-time student and needed to finish my degree as well as attend to the students I was teaching. After being announced the winner of the audition, I promptly returned back home to my dorm room and went back to practicing … for my assignments the next day at school!

[Fast forward to the future, in the year 2020, I have received my National Ballet of Canada 20-year anniversary pin!]

I was by far the youngest in the orchestra, and on my first day on the job, I was placed in the Concertmaster chair to lead the orchestra’s Nutcracker rehearsal. I was the only one that day who had never played Nutcracker before!

I was inexperienced and unsavvy. (I have since written a Student’s Guide to Orchestra Etiquette - what to do, what NOT to do. I wished I had had that guide when I was a student!)

I learned the ropes and despite the Assistant Concertmaster chair in the National Ballet of Canada Orchestra being legendarily called “The Ejector Seat”, I was awarded my tenure. The Music Director at the time, Ormsby Wilkins, conveyed the good news to me over the phone and instructed me to stop and celebrate. I think I went back to my practicing.  

I’ve counted myself fortunate to have done the majority of my world travelling through work. Western Canada tours with the National Ballet of Canada, as well as United States, European, and Israel tours with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra have all been memorable. (Ask me one day about how I ended up eating my own ear plug in Edmonton or how I got scammed by a taxi driver in Prague!)

Always eager to perform outside of an orchestra setting, I’ve also accumulated a fun collection of performance stories and experiences from all over the world: dining on pig's brain after giving world premieres of contemporary music in China, getting kicked out of a train at the Ukrainian/Hungarian border (the same night I traded solos with a gypsy orchestra in Budapest!), staying in Napoleon’s room while performing a recital in Poland, performing chamber music at Georges Enescu’s Palace in Bucharest, and getting to play on the world’s most valuable violins and bows at the Chimei Museum the day after I performed as a soloist with the Tainan Symphony.

How exactly did I evolve from being a violin nerd into an active, athletic martial artist and salsera as a mature adult? … By being pushed into a karate dojo by a friend and discovering the salsa class next door 8 months later!

The most common questions I get asked are:

“Are you going to go for the black belt?”

“Are you breaking boards?”   

My answers:

It is not the belt that is the destination. It is showing up every day to train, push my boundaries, face my fears, and blast past my perceived limitations.

And besides, I can always break the board with my foot. 👍

However, please don’t ask me to do so with my salsa shoes on. I have several pairs of salsa shoes now and wouldn’t want to ruin their heels.

It is through the recent course of my career that I started training for some large orchestra auditions and decided to train with peak performance psychologist, Dr. Don Greene, as well as pursuing studies with Nathan Cole, First Associate Concertmaster of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in his inaugural Virtuoso Master Course.

Alongside my forays into martial arts and dance classes, audition-taking forced me to become increasingly comfortable with being uncomfortable.

My new favourite motto:

Dr. Susan Jeffers' book of the same name was among my homework to read while coaching with Dr. Greene.

In my 20th year at the National Ballet, I applied for a sabbatical replacement teaching position as Visiting Assistant Professor of Violin at Memorial of University of Newfoundland’s School of Music. I signed a contract in November 2019 and while playing 27 Nutcrackers in December, keeping up with the whirlwind of the holiday season, getting my place ready for a subletter, preparing for a new professional identity, and uprooting my entire life to a new province, I zoomed through the holiday season working long hours on the computer, well into the wee hours each night.

In January 2020, I arrived back home in Newfoundland where it all began, but this time as Dr. Lynn, the violin professor, instructing the students in the studio of my former teacher, Nancy Dahn.

Between the week-long Snowmageddon that crippled Newfoundland into a State of Emergency in January and the global pandemic announced in March, my teaching stint at Memorial University was an adventurous, if not truncated, one.

April 2020 marked my dramatic pivot (yet another pivot in a matter of months) to the role of an online entrepreneur. Violin with Dr. Lynn was born in June 2020 and my inaugural program, Summer Violin Bootcamp with Dr. Lynn was a great success drawing in 17 violin students from the United States and Canada.

As much as I enjoy the challenge of interpreting and performing new works in front of audiences and participating in or leading an ensemble or orchestra, I also love teaching and coaching other musicians to be the best they can be on their instruments and to become more fearless performers.

I encourage other musicians to embrace their fears and push through doubts and insecurities - whether they be related to performing, teaching, speaking, or starting a new venture. It is important to get comfortable with what causes discomfort. In so doing, one can experience results that are both astounding and rewarding.

As a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician, Lynn has performed across Canada, the United States, Wales, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, Ukraine, China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. She has performed with the Tainan Symphony Orchestra, Quebec Symphony Orchestra, Newfoundland Symphony Orchestra, Thirteen Strings, Canadian Sinfonietta, Brandon Chamber Players, Nexus percussion ensemble, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra (Bulgaria), Cantus Ensemble (Croatia), Lviv Philharmonic, Lviv Virtuosi (Ukraine), and as guest soloist with Hungary’s gypsy orchestra, Rajkó Band.

In demand as an interpreter of new music, Lynn has given numerous world premieres in North America, Europe, and Asia of acoustic and electroacoustic solo and chamber works written by composers around the world. These works have been written for her and various ensembles that have included the Les AMIS Ensemble, Duo Vita, and the Kuo-Humetska duo with Ukrainian-Canadian pianist, Marianna Humetska.

Lynn’s performances have been broadcast on Canadian, Serbian, and Hungarian radio and television and can be heard on the NAXOS label (Works of Nino Rota) and on her self-produced CD with pianist Marianna Humetska: LOVE: Innocence, Passion, Obsession, available on iTunes, Spotify, CD Baby, and Amazon.

Having completed studies with Lorand Fenyves, Mayumi Seiler, and Erika Raum, and post-doctoral studies with Burton Kaplan and Nathan Cole, Lynn holds a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Toronto, having dedicated her research to the subject of holistic health and injury prevention in orchestral string musicians. When not playing the violin, Lynn can be spotted on social media posting violin tutorials or perfecting her karate kicks or salsa dancing turn patterns.