Elisabeth Leonskaja (born November 23, 1945) is a distinguished Soviet and Austrian pianist and teacher. She was born to a family of Jewish and Polish extraction living in Tbilisi, then the capital of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1964, she began studies in the Moscow Conservatory. During her conservatory years she won prizes in the prestigious Enescu, Marguerite Long–Jacques Thibaud and Queen Elizabeth international piano competitions in Bucharest, Paris and Brussels.