biographies

Tom Hammond - Artistic Director

Tom Hammond relishes conducting an interesting range of repertoire, and is as happy working in the operatic world as he is with symphonic /chamber music, or devising educational projects.

In 2006 he was selected by Sir Charles Mackerras to become the first Junior Fellow in Conducting at Trinity College of Music, London. During this two year post Tom conducted opera (including Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites), assisted visiting conductors, and worked with all of the college ensembles. He is now a regular guest conductor at Trinity.

Tom's musical career started as a professional trombonist, and after graduating from The Royal Academy of Music with a First in performance, he enjoyed ten years of successful freelance work with leading ensembles such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, King's Consort, Gabrieli Consort and Europa Galante. In 2005 he opted to concentrate on conducting as a full-time occupation.

Tom is Artistic Director of the critically acclaimed ensemble sound collective, with which he has given several World and London premières, notably Matthew Taylor's Symphony No. 3. Tom has also conducted music by other noted contemporary composers including John McCabe, David Matthews, Robert Saxton, Paul Patterson, Elena Firsova, and Bernard Hughes.

Tom’s potential was highlighted in 2005 by Finnish Maestro Esa-Pekka Salonen, when he selected him as one of only twenty conductors world-wide to participate in the prestigious Sibelius International Conductors’ Competition, where he conducted the Finnish Radio Symphony in some of the most challenging works in the repertoire. In 2007 Tom made his début with the London Symphony Orchestra Brass Ensemble, conducting the World Première of Alvin Curran’s Maritime Rites at Tate Modern.

Tom has also been asked to lead music education and outreach programmes for Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, and the Historic Royal Palaces. He was Musical Director for the 2000/01 English National Opera's Baylis Programme production of Weill's Die Dreigroschenoper in London and Berlin, produced by the leading community art organisation 1st Framework.

"The orchestra’s rapturous acclaim for him was visible testimony to their esteem for his contribution…"

The Classical Source 2007

"...His meticulous work on this difficult score was quite simply perfect...He has an easy and natural authority on the rostrum..."

Barry Wordsworth (Music Director, Royal Ballet) 2008

Matthew Taylor - Associate Artist

Matthew won a Music Scholarship to Queen’s College, Cambridge, in 1983 where he studied with Robin Holloway and conducted the University orchestras. In 1986 he was awarded the Conducting Scholarship to Guildhall School of Music and, after further studies as a post graduate at the Royal Academy of Music, gained the Dip RAM - their highest award. He also studied with Leonard Bernstein and conducted with Bernstein at the 1987 Schleswig-Holstein Festival. He subsequently received special encouragement from Robert Simpson and Sir Malcolm Arnold.

He has appeared as Guest Conductor with English Chamber Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, City of London Sinfonia, Royal Ballet Sinfonia, European Community Chamber Orchestra and St Petersburg State Academic Orchestra. He has recorded for Hyperion Records and the Dutton label. His world premiere CD of Simpson’s 11th Symphony was selected by Radio 3 and Gramophone as a Record of the Year in 2004.

Matthew Taylor’s widely performed Symphony No.1(1985) led to a number of important commissions. His works have been championed by BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Allegri and Dante Quartets, Emily Beynon, Emma Johnson, John McCabe, Martyn Brabbins, Martin Roscoe, George Hurst, Richard Watkins and Raphael Wallfisch. His music has been recorded by Toccata Classics, Dutton Epoch and ASV White Line Series. To date he has written three symphonies, concertos for clarinet, piano, horn and double bass, seven string quartets, a piano trio, other chamber music and songs.In 2009 he will assume the role as Artistic Director of the St Petersburg British Music Festival. The BBC Symphony Orchestra gave a highly successful first performance of his Second Symphony in January of this year. His 1st and 3rd Symphonies were recently released on the Dutton Epoch Label great critical acclaim. For more information please visit www.matthewtaylor-composer.com

Pamela Hay - Soprano

Polish-American soprano Pamela Hay has been praised by Opera magazine for her "fine lyric voice", "beautifully coloured" phrasing, and "touching" characterizations.  She was born in New York City and studied at the Royal College of Music and Peabody Conservatory, USA. Having received scholarships for apprenticeships at Aspen Music Festival and Mozarteum Salzburg as well as Peabody's prestigious Charles M. Eaton voice award, Kathleen and Wallace Hankins Award in Voice and the Azalia Thomas Prize, she has participated in masterclasses with Barbara Bonney and Philip Langridge.

Roles performed include Ellen Lakmé (Opera Holland Park), Donna Elvira Don Giovanni (British Youth Opera, supported by an HSBC Scholarship award and Pamela Litman), Lucretia Dumbfounded (Tête à Tête Opera Festival at Riverside Studios), Bubikopf Kaiser of Atlantis (Wigmore Hall Education), title role Merry Widow (Opera UK at Bloomsbury Theatre), Yum-Yum The Mikado (Buxton Opera House, The Lowry Centre and UK tour with Opera Della Luna), Rosmene Imeneo (Cambridge Handel Opera Group), Cobweb A Midsummer Night's Dream (Houston Grand Opera), Bacchis La Belle Hélène (Iford Opera Festival), Créuse (British premiere, Milhaud’s Médée), Barbarina Le Nozze di Figaro (Lyric Hammersmith),  Pamina, Norina, Euridice (Gluck), Belinda, Anne Page, La Princesse L’enfant et les Sortilèges, Elle La Voix humaine.  She has also performed roles written for her voice at Shakespeare's Globe (including Psyche in The Golden Ass with Mark Rylance, and Mna Siubhail in Dominic Dromgoole's acclaimed King Lear) and the Theatre Royal Drury Lane with BBC Concert Orchestra.  She was invited to read Caroline in Kenneth Hesketh's new opera The Holy Drinker for ROH2's OperaGenesis workshops at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.

She has sung solo recitals at Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Moscow, St.Petersburg, Salzburg, Belgium, Costa Rica, and in USA (including Kennedy Center). As a concert soloist she has performed at St.Johns Smith Square, Little Missenden Festival, St.Albans Cathedral, Paisley Abbey and across UK.  She is associate soprano with new orchestra sound collective, and has been a regular soloist with the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra and the Guildford Philharmonic.  She has also appeared live on the Voice of America radio network and BBC Radio 3's "In Tune" programme.

Julian Sperry - Flute

Born in 1967, Julian Sperry began his musical education at Chetham’s School of Music, and from there was awarded a scholarship to the Paris Conservatoire where he studied under Alain Marion, Michel Debost and Raymond Guiot.

Julian is currently Principal Flute with Glyndebourne Opera on Tour and Garsington Opera and has made guest appearances with orchestras such as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Berlin Symphony, and has been a guest Principal with the City of Birmingham Symphony, Welsh National Opera, London Mozart Players and the London Symphony Orchestra who invited him on their tours of America, Japan and Austria. He has worked with conductors such as Haitink, Tilson-Thomas, Zweden, Hickox, Vasary and Norrington and enjoys a busy freelance career with many of the UK’s leading orchestras and ensembles.

As a soloist, Julian has given recital and concerto performances throughout Europe and the United States, and at major international festivals in the UK including Harrogate and Lichfield, giving his London debut in 1991 at the Purcell Room as a winner of the Park Lane Group competition, where the Guardian heralded “a young artist of exceptional ability”. Two years later he made his Wigmore Hall debut, sponsored by the Tillett Trust, Myra Hess Trust and Daily Mail. Julian has also performed concertos at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Fairfield Halls, St John’s Smith Square and the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford.

The winner of numerous competitions and awards, Julian has played for Radio-France, Classic FM and BBC Radio, and performed concertos and recitals for television and radio in Britain and the States. His recordings include a CD of solo flute works titled ‘Flute Alone’ which received a special commendation in the 1996 Vienna Modern Masters Performers Competition, a CD of works by Richard Sisson, titled ‘Sonata’, specially commissioned for him by the Harrogate International Festival, a recital CD which the Evening Standard selected as one of their “Critics’ Choice” and chosen in 2006 for broadcast on Radio3’s ‘Private Passions’, Bach’s 4th Brandenburg with the London Baroque Ensemble, and Bach’s Triple Concerto for ASV label. More recent recordings include works by Robin Milford for flute and string ensemble (Hyperion), a number of concerto and chamber music CD’s with the Adderbury Ensemble and a selection of works for flute and piano by the Scottish composer Timothy Murray.

Stuart Eminson - Clarinet

Stuart’s musical interest started at the age of 10 when he was entered for a fancy dress competition as a famous pop star and won 2nd prize. He then went from that to playing the recorder, the church bells, and finally the clarinet.

As a graduate of the Royal Academy of Music, studying with Angela Malsbury, Nicholas Rodwell and Richard Addsion he won several plaudits including the John Solomon prize for solo recital, the Geoffrey Hawkes prize for clarinet and the Nicholas Blake prize for chamber music.

To date, his freelance career has taken him as far afield as India with the Symphony Orchestra of India, ITV’s X Factor with Girls Aloud, recording for Balcony TV (literally on a balcony) overlooking Camden Lock, Kazakhstan with the West Kazakhstan Philharmonic Orchestra, The Maestro on BBC 2 and quite a bit more!

Stuart regularly plays as guest principal clarinet with the English National Ballet Orchestra as well as the Royal Ballet Sinfonia and the BBC Concert Orchestra. He has recorded and played live for broadcast on both BBC Radio 2 and 3 and well as CD recordings for Sony BMG Classics, Soul Jazz Records, and Electric M.E.L.T. Amongst other artists, he has played for saxophonist Chris Bowden; drummer Andrew Missingham, singer/songwriter Kate Nash, Westlife, Pink Martini, Marti Pello, Courtney Pine. Mica Paris, Glen Campbell and Joe Brown.

He is very pleased to be a part of sound collective, Stuart’s passion for solo and chamber music being a integral part of his career. He is a member of the Emnica Duo, the Junge Deutsche Sinfonie, a co-founder member of A U R A, and has also played with chamber groups such as the Galliard Ensemble, Continuum, London Chamber Group and Clod. Concerto performances include Richard Strauss Duet Concertino with bassoonist John McDougall and just this year, Copland Clarinet Concerto with conductor Marc Dooley.

In 2006, Stuart was featured in The Classical Music Magazine produced by Rhinegold Publishing Ltd. The article is on his portfolio career as a clarinettist in what is already a fierce and competitive genre of work. Please visit his website www.stuarteminson.com for more information.

"The Maria Callas of the clarinet"

Schubert Society of Great Britain

"now singing, now speaking, now caressing, now screaming, now smouldering, now dancing, now whispering...truly a performance to remember from a clarinettist to watch..."

John Hawks, Times and Leisure Magazine

Adrian Woodward - Trumpet

Gloucester born Adrian Woodward is a Trinity College of Music graduate, a post graduate of the Royal College of Music and the Musik Akademie, Basle. He studied primarily modern trumpet and piano yet also has interests in older instruments, inspired by listening to recordings of the early brass pioneers such as Don Smithers, Michael Laird, and Iaan Wilson. Based in London, Adrian is pursuing a international freelance career as a soloist and principal trumpet. His work ranges from contemporary music with sound collective, opera with The Royal Opera House, and Baroque music with all the London based period instrument groups such as The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

He has also played on many film and TV credits including Bedtime Stories (Disney 2008.) For 12 years he has been a regular MD and player at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, playing in over 20 productions. Adrian's skills have led him to learn other 17th Century instruments that are not made of brass like the hurdy-gurdy, recorders and bagpipes, as well as modern instruments such as the hang. He enjoys teaching the trumpet, baroque trumpet and cornetto to students at the Royal College of Music, and is the trumpet Teacher and brass ensemble coach at Haberdashers' Aske's School for Girls, Elstree.

"Impressive was trumpet soloist Adrian Woodward who coped superbly with the restrictive functions of the baroque trumpet"

Oxford Times

Mary Martin - Violin

Mary Martin studied violin and chamber music at the Royal Academy of Music as a postgraduate, after completing a Joint Honors Degree in Biology and Geography at the University of Bristol.

Since then, she has enjoyed a varied career as an orchestral and chamber musician and music workshop leader. She is a member of the Royal Ballet Sinfonia (the orchestra for Birmingham Royal Ballet) performing throughout the UK and abroad, as well as devising and leading numerous music workshops for the BRB Education Department. She also performs on a freelance basis with several UK orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the Killian String Quartet, formed during her time at the RAM.

Mary’s activities and training as a music workshop leader have allowed her the thrill of working creatively with an extremely wide range of people in the community: from prisoners to dementia patients to school children and those with special needs, through organisations such as Music for Life / Wigmore Hall, Aldeburgh Education and Music in Prisons. She is also an Outreach Mentor at the Royal College of Music, helping undergraduates prepare to deliver workshops in local primary schools.

She was awarded a Tubney Trust Bursary to complete a Diploma in Creative Leadership at the RCM in 2006-7, offering her valuable opportunities to study written and collaborative composition, improvisation and various philosophies behind creative music making in the community.

Rebecca Brown - Viola / Violin

Rebecca has been a member of the Philharmonia Orchestra viola section for six years. She was born in Paris and moved to New-York with her parents at the age of 11, where she studied the violin at the Mannes pre-College of Music and the Meadowmount Music School. On her return to Europe, 4 years later, Rebecca became a pupil at the Yehudi Menuhin School in Surrey where she studied with Wen-Zhou Li. She continued her studies with him at the Royal Northern College of Music (1994-98) where she pioneered a new 'joint course' involving extra academic work. Her final year 17000-word dissertation was on pianist Glenn Gould.

Since leaving the Northern, Rebecca has been active as a chamber musician, recitalist and teacher at Alleyn's School in Dulwich as well as fulfilling her commitments with the Philharmonia. Rebecca Brown is leaving the Philharmonia this summer in order to join the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House.

Rose Redgrave - Viola

After studying at the Royal Northern College of Music, Rose was awarded a scholarship to the Royal Academy and in 1998 became a Leverhulme Fellow of Chamber Music.

Passionate about chamber music she enjoys a varied and fulfilling career as a violist, regularly performing with the mixed chamber ensemble CHROMA, Manchester based Goldberg Ensemble and the contemporary music group Lontano in concerts, tours and radio broadcasts. Rose plays regularly with Music Theatre Wales in acclaimed performances in Covent Garden and around the country, and last year toured Scotland and appeared at the Wigmore Hall with the Scottish Ensemble . She enjoys regular visits to the Endellion Festival where she is principal viola and has given concerto performances. Rose also interested in period performance, playing with Sir John-Elliot Gardiner's Orchestre Revolutionaire et Romantique and The Revolutionary Drawing Room.

Judith Fleet - Cello

Judith won a scholarship at the age of 13 to study the cello with Florence Hooton. She later continued her studies as an undergraduate at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Stefan Popov and was awarded the Pleeth Cello Prize.

Judith has always been an active chamber musician and thrives on diversity. She has played regularly for Live Music Now!, the Yehudi Menuhin scheme designed to take music into the community, as well as numerous string quartet performances for festivals and schools including projects for London Symphony Orchestra Discovery and the BBC.

Judith is a Mentor Scheme tutor, orchestral and ensemble coach at Trinty College of Music, and has tutored at the Royal Academy of Music and Royal College of Music as well as Kent, Leicestershire and Hampshire County Youth Orchestras.

Since 1997 Judith has played extensively with the Philharmonia Orchestra , including participating in many of their education department projects and performances. She also plays as a guest with the BBC Concert Orchestra and Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.

Clare O'Connell - Cello

Clare O’Connell has been passionate about the cello since she picked one up at the age of 9.

After graduating from Wadham College Oxford with a BA hons in Ancient and Modern History she returned to her first love, studying at postgraduate level at the RCM and later at the Hochschule fur Kunste, Bremen, with Alexander Baillie.

Clare now pursues a busy freelance career and has performed all over the UK and Europe. She is a founder member of the acclaimed ensemble CHROMA, the Rothko string trio and the saxaphone quartet B(l)ow, and has also appeared with the Mainardi Trio, the Marais Ensemble and the Le Page Ensemble. She is a prolific performer of contemporary music, has worked with the New Music Players, Uroborus Ensemble and Psappha, and has been involved in the commissioning of new works for CHROMA and Rothko. She is a core member of Orchestra of the Swan and has also appeared with the RPO, BBC Welsh, Ulster Orchestra and Liverpool Philharmonic.