Andrea Quinn was born in 1964 and studied conducting at the Royal Academy of Music with Colin Metters, George Hurst and John Carewe. In 1989 she left the Academy with the Ernest Read and Ricordi Conducting Prizes. She was then awarded the National Association of Youth Orchestras’ Conductor's Bursary for further study abroad which took her to Hungary for the Bartok International Seminar.

Andrea Quinn has worked with many of Britain’s leading orchestras including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Hallé Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Northern Sinfonia, the London Mozart Players, the City of London Sinfonia and the Bournemouth Sinfonietta and made her BBC Prom debut in 2000. She was Music Director of the London Philharmonic Youth Orchestra for three years.

Orchestral engagements abroad have included the Adelaide and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras, the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra, the Fresno Philharmonic, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra, the Toledo Symphony Orchestra, the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, the Jönköpings Sinfonietta, the Vasteras Sinfonietta, the NRK Radio Orchestra in Oslo, the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, the Lahti Sinfonia, the Odense Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Teatro Regio Turin, Sinfonieorchester Wuppertal, Holland Symfonia, Musikkollegium Winterthur, Orchestre de Bretagne, Opera de Rouen, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra and the Commonwealth Youth Orchestra for the opening of the Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur. She made her debut at the Musikverein Vienna in 2002.

Andrea Quinn was Music Director for a newly commissioned opera for children, Misper, at Glyndebourne in March 1997, nominated for the TMA’s Best Achievement in Opera Award. She made her debut at English National Opera in 2000 conducting Four Saints in Three Acts, directed by Mark Morris. Miss Quinn conducted Richard Wagner's Der fliegende Holländer for Norrlands Opera and Verdi's Aida for the Malmö Opera, where she will return to conduct Duke Bluebeard's Castle and The Miraculous Mandarin in a new Bartok double-bill in 2010.

During 1997 Andrea Quinn made her debut at The Royal Opera House conducting the Royal Ballet’s Anastasia. From 1998 to 2001 she was the Music Director of The Royal Ballet during which time she conducted Cinderella on the Company’s tours to Turin and Frankfurt and Swan Lake on tour in Japan, China and North America. She conducted Ondine, nominated for London Weekend TV South Bank Show’s Best Achievement in Ballet Award, and Romeo and Juliet, Nutcracker, Manon, and a Diaghilev Triple Bill.

Miss Quinn has conducted Sleeping Beauty and Nutcracker for the Royal Stockholm Ballet, Nutcracker for the Royal New Zealand Ballet, Cinderella and Giselle for the Teatro San Carlo, Naples, a tribute to Hans van Manen and a Georges Balanchine Triple Bill for Dutch National Ballet and La Fille mal gardée in Catania. She conducted Adventures in Motion Pictures’ Swan Lake at the Piccadilly Theatre.

Andrea Quinn conducted a recording of Paul McCartney’s Tuesday with the London Symphony Orchestra for EMI Records, for which she was nominated as Female Artist of the Year by the British Phonographic Industry’s inaugural Classical Brit Awards. She conducted Thierry Pécou's L'oiseau innumérable for Harmonia Mundi with the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, orchestral works by J. J. Raff with SONO for Sterling Records and piano concertos by Saint-Saëns with Brigitte Engerer and the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris for Mirare (winning the RTL's d'Or du Mois)