Lydia Mordkovitch was a Russian violinist.
Lydia was born in Saratov, Russia, on 30 April 1944. She returned with her parents to Kishinev after the war. In 1960, she moved to Odessa, where she studied at the Stolyarsky School of Music until 1962. She then moved to Moscow where she studied at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory under David Oistrakh, later serving as his assistant from 1968 to 1970. During this period, she married and had a daughter, and won the National Young Musicians Competition in Kiev in 1967 and the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud Competition in Paris in 1969.
In 1970-73, she studied at the Institute of Arts. She taught at the Israeli Academy of Music in Jerusalem in 1974-79, when she made her first appearance in the UK with the Hallé Orchestra. She settled permanently in the UK in 1980. Her marriage ended during this period. Her United States debut was in 1982 with Georg Solti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, when she performed the Glazounov Violin Concerto.
Mordkovitch recorded for RCA Red Seal and Chandos. Her Chandos debut recording contained sonatas by composers such as Prokofiev, Schumann, and Richard Strauss.