Richard Tognetti was born in Canberra, Australia and raised in Wollongong. He studied briefly with the violist William Primrose in Wollongong,[1] and then at the Sydney Conservatorium High School with Alice Waten. In 1980 he won the National Youth Concerto Competition held in Brisbane with the Queensland Youth Symphony under John Curro. Other winners have included Li Wei Qin in 1993 and Ray Chen in 2002. He undertook post-graduate study with Igor Ozim at the Bern Conservatory, where he was awarded the Tschumi prize in 1989.