When Nadia Boulanger visited Goucher College (Towson, MD), she awarded the composer a scholarship to study at the Conservatoire Americaine in Fontainebleau, France, after hearing Austin's song cycle Drei Rilke Lieder.
While studying for her Ph.D. at The University of Connecticut, Elizabeth Austin won First Prize in the Lipscomb Electronic Music Competition (with her Klavier Double for piano and tape).
Her awards have included a Connecticut Commission on the Arts grant, selection by GEDOK (Society of Women Artists in Germany/Austria) to represent the Mannheim region in its 70th anniversary exhibition, and First Prize in IAWM's 1998 Miriam Gideon Competition (for Homage for Hildegard von Bingen, and a Rockefeller Foundation residency at Bellagio, Italy (2001).
Featured on Germany's Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk, the Leipzig pianist Ulrich Urban has championed her piano music, performing at the Gewandhaus and The National Gallery of Art.
Austin's music is published by Arsis Press, Tonger Musikverlag, Peer Musik, Certosa and recorded on the Parma (Capstone) and Leonarda labels as well as on the 1994 Society of Composers CD and Journal (Vol.