The violinist Ulf Schneider studied in Hanover, New York and Berlin with Jens Ellermann, Felix Galimir, Masao Kawasaki and Thomas Zehetmair. Further artistic impulses from Hatto Beyerle, Eberhard Feltz, Nicolaus Harnoncourt and Sir Roger Norrington enriched and shaped his studies.
Together with Martin Löhr and Eckart Heiligers he founded the Trio Jean Paul in 1991/92, which was awarded first prizes and numerous special prizes at the international chamber music competitions in Melbourne and Osaka as well as at the German Music Competition in Bonn. Extensive international concert activity takes him regularly to well-known concert halls and music metropolises, such as the Philharmonics of Berlin and Cologne, the Alte Oper Frankfurt, the Laeiszhalle Hamburg, with the Trio Jean Paul, in duo with Stephan Imorde and Jan Philip Schulze and with the Bartholdy Quintet, the Laeiszhalle Hamburg, the Wigmore Hall in London, the Tonhalle Zurich, the Sydney Opera House, the Konzerthaus Dortmund, the Mozarteum Salzburg, the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Palais Beaux Arts in Brussels, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam and the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon. He is a welcome guest at many festivals, such as the Rheingau Musik Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Festival, the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival, the Musikfest Berlin, the Mozartfest Würzburg, the Festspiele Baden-Baden, the Ludwigsburger Festspiele, the Heidelberger Frühling, the Kissinger Sommer, the Niedersächsische Musiktage, the Stuttgarter Musikfest, the Edinburgh Festival, the Beethovenfest Bonn and the Schubertiade Schwarzenberg.
As a soloist he has given concerts with, among others with the Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn, the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn, the Orchestra Musikkollegium Winterthur, the WDR Symphony Orchestra, the Radiophilharmonie Hannover, the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, the Orchestra I Pomeriggi Musicali Milano, the Presidential Orchestra Ankara, the North Bohemian Philharmonic Teplice, the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, the Tucson Symphony Orchestra and the Prague National Theatre Orchestra conducted by Erich Bergel, Jörg Faerber, Antonello Manacorda, Charles Olivieri-Munroe, Eiji Oue, Petri Sakari, Marc Soustrot, George Hanson, Gerd Schaller, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Jaap van Zweden and Sylvain Cambreling.