Peter Bassano
Encyclopedia
Peter Bassano is an English conductor
.
the oldest brother of a family of six Venetian musicians brought to England by King Henry VIII
is registered at the College of Arms
. Three generations of the Bassano family dominated instrumental music at the English Court from 1540 until the death of Charles I
. In 1973 the historian A. L. Rowse
nominated the poet Emilia Lanier
, daughter of Baptist Bassano, as his candidate for the Dark Lady of the Shakespeare Sonnets.
to Birtwistle
– The Virtuosi of the Mannheim Court, The City of Rochester Symphony Orchestra, the professional choir, The Gentlemen of the Chappell, The Equale Baroque Players, Wendover Choral Society, City of Cambridge Band and Oxford Touring Opera. He has appeared as guest conductor with the Britten/Pears Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, Hong Kong Academy Wind Orchestra, Imperial College Symphony Orchestra, Royal Melbourne Philharmonic
Choir, National Youth Wind Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic, Royal Oman Symphony, Ulster Youth Orchestra, Vaasa City Orchestra as well as at many conservatoires, choirs and bands around the world.
He studied trombone and singing at the Royal College of Music
1965–68. As a trombonist, he was a member of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra
for twenty seven years but retained a commitment to the performance of wider musical genres than just the symphonic, including early music on original instruments. He played the sackbut
for David Munrow
's Early Music Consort, the English Baroque Soloists
, the Gabrieli Consort and His Majesties Sagbutts and Cornetts http://www.hmsc.co.uk/ as well as playing the trombone occasionally for the London Sinfonietta
. As an orchestral musician he played under Abbado, Boulez, Britten, Davis
, Gardiner
, Giulini, Harnoncourt
, Klemperer
, Kubelik
, Levine
, Lutoslawski, MacMillan, Maxwell-Davies, Mehta
, Muti, Maazel, Norrington
, Penderecki, Rattle
, Salonen, Sinopoli, Svetlanov, Tilson-Thomas and Zinman.
He was elected for two terms to the Philharmonia's Council of Management and was a member of the Orchestra's Artistic Planning Committee of four, the others being Amelia Freedman, Robert Ponsonby and John Wallace.
His career as a free-lance trombone
player took him to all of the London orchestras, playing in many West-end musicals, including Golden Boy, Man of la Mancha, Threepenny Opera, The Great Waltz, the National Theatre
(Much Ado about Nothing, H, Three Sisters), a run of Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale at the Young Vic, the Philip Jones Brass Ensemble, films – Brother Sun and Sister Moon, Meaning of Life, Oliver, Ryan's Daughter, Superman 2, The Devils, The Lion in Winter, Watership Down and Women in Love – and television – All Creatures Great and Small, Black Beauty, Elizabeth R, I, Claudius, The Pallisers – and touring and recording with the Bee Gees
, Pink Floyd
and the Beatles on the chart topping Hey Jude
.
He was the founder, trombonist and Artistic Director of the brass quintet, Equale Brass. This ensemble, which was composed of Philharmonia players John Wallace, John Miller (trumpets), Michael Thompson (horn) and John Jenkins (tuba), made seven records, toured worldwide, and commissioned twenty seven new works from composers as diverse as David Bedford
, Peter Skellern
, Roger Smalley
and John Tavener
. Bassano acted as Secretary to the Equale Trust, a registered charity that supported the commissioning of composers and sought sponsorship for the work of Equale Brass.
, The Guardian
, The Independent
and The Times
– and presented research on the Bassano Family, Beethoven, Byrd
, Shakespeare and Veronese
. Bassano has served as a competition adjudicator for the BBC Young Musician of the Year
, European Music Prize for Youth, Royal OverSeas League, Charterhouse
, Eton College
, Brass Band Championships of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Yorkshire. He has been an external examiner for the Royal Academy of Music
, Royal Northern College of Music
, Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Trinity College of Music
.
, Nikolaus Harnoncourt
, Elgar Howarth, Sir Charles Mackerras
, Sir Roger Norrington
, Jorma Panula
and Bramwell Tovey. It was these teachers plus his own broad playing experience that shaped his distinctive and historically aware approach to interpretation.
He was assistant conductor conductor to Paul McCreesh
and his Gabrieli Consort and Players on the award winning Venetian Coronation and Music at San Rocco and Sir John Eliot Gardiner for his Berlioz Romeo and Juliet recording projects. His recording of music by the early Bassanos and the musical associates of Giovanni Bassano
the Gabrieli
s and Monteverdi, Venice Preserved on the ASV label received critical acclaim.
In Great Britain
, he has conducted at the Royal Festival Hall
sharing the podium with Vladimir Ashkenazy
in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra's International Series and at the Royal Albert Hall
in a BBC Promenade Concert and at Symphony Hall, Birmingham. In addition he has made several Festival appearances at Aldeburgh
, Chester, Greenwich, Nottingham, the Three Choirs.
He has conducted the RCM Chamber Choir (including the first performance in modern times of Beethoven's Trauerklange), introduced a standing RCM Symphony Orchestra to an historically aware performance of Berlioz Sinfonie fantastique and directed the Baroque Orchestra in performances of three of Bach
's Brandenberg Concertos at Buckingham Palace
. In January 1995 he was one of the first conductors to appear at the newly built Paris concert hall, Cité de la Musique
. He returned to this major Paris
venue in July 1998 to conduct two concerts with the Grimethorpe Colliery Band
to ecstatic reviews and high profile TV coverage.
A champion of new music, he has commissioned and conducted the first performances of Tim Souster
's Echoes (Manchester/BBC Radio 3), Joseph Horovitz
's Tuba Concerto (Nottingham Festival) and Andrew Powell's Falstaff: Theme and Episodes (Paris, Cité de la Musique), Chris Batchelor's Weasel Words & Winning Ways, Max Charles Davies's Trinity-Credo, Simon Dobson's Four Britten Sketches and Fanfare for Peter, Aaron Einbond's Floral Decorations for Bananas, Edmund Joliffe's Breeze, Gabriella Swallow's Spit, Ivor Bonnici’s Three Movements for Chamber Orchestra and the UK premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen
's Stockholm Diary.
Member of the Royal College of Music 1982
Conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...
.
Family
His descent from Anthony BassanoAnthony Bassano
Anthony Bassano was a 16th century Italian musician.Bassano, born in Bassano del Grappa, Italy, was one of six sons of Jeronimo Bassano who moved from Venice to England to the household of Henry VIII to serve the court, probably in 1540...
the oldest brother of a family of six Venetian musicians brought to England by King Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
is registered at the College of Arms
College of Arms
The College of Arms, or Heralds’ College, is an office regulating heraldry and granting new armorial bearings for England, Wales and Northern Ireland...
. Three generations of the Bassano family dominated instrumental music at the English Court from 1540 until the death of Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
. In 1973 the historian A. L. Rowse
A. L. Rowse
Alfred Leslie Rowse, CH, FBA , known professionally as A. L. Rowse and to friends and family as Leslie, was a British historian from Cornwall. He is perhaps best known for his work on Elizabethan England and his poetry about Cornwall. He was also a Shakespearean scholar and biographer...
nominated the poet Emilia Lanier
Emilia Lanier
Emilia Lanier, also spelled Lanyer, was the first Englishwoman to assert herself as a professional poet through her single volume of poems, Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum...
, daughter of Baptist Bassano, as his candidate for the Dark Lady of the Shakespeare Sonnets.
Performing career
Bassano has been Music Director of the Oxford University Sinfonietta – whose broad repertoire spans from BiberBiber
The Biber was a German midget submarine of the Second World War. Armed with two externally mounted 21-inch torpedoes or mines, they were intended to attack coastal shipping. They were the smallest submarines in the Kriegsmarine.The Biber was hastily developed to help meet the threat of an Allied...
to Birtwistle
Harrison Birtwistle
Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...
– The Virtuosi of the Mannheim Court, The City of Rochester Symphony Orchestra, the professional choir, The Gentlemen of the Chappell, The Equale Baroque Players, Wendover Choral Society, City of Cambridge Band and Oxford Touring Opera. He has appeared as guest conductor with the Britten/Pears Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, Hong Kong Academy Wind Orchestra, Imperial College Symphony Orchestra, Royal Melbourne Philharmonic
Royal Melbourne Philharmonic
Royal Melbourne Philharmonic is a 120-voice choir and orchestra in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It was established in 1853, and is reportedly Australia's oldest surviving cultural organisation....
Choir, National Youth Wind Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic, Royal Oman Symphony, Ulster Youth Orchestra, Vaasa City Orchestra as well as at many conservatoires, choirs and bands around the world.
He studied trombone and singing at the Royal College of Music
Royal College of Music
The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire founded by Royal Charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, England.-Background:The first director was Sir George Grove and he was followed by Sir Hubert Parry...
1965–68. As a trombonist, he was a member of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra
Philharmonia Orchestra
The Philharmonia Orchestra is one of the leading orchestras in Great Britain, based in London. Since 1995, it has been based in the Royal Festival Hall. In Britain it is also the resident orchestra at De Montfort Hall, Leicester and the Corn Exchange, Bedford, as well as The Anvil, Basingstoke...
for twenty seven years but retained a commitment to the performance of wider musical genres than just the symphonic, including early music on original instruments. He played the sackbut
Sackbut
The sackbut is a trombone from the Renaissance and Baroque eras, i.e., a musical instrument in the brass family similar to the trumpet except characterised by a telescopic slide with which the player varies the length of the tube to change pitches, thus allowing them to obtain chromaticism, as...
for David Munrow
David Munrow
David Munrow was a British musician and early music historian.- Biography and career :Munrow was born in Birmingham and was the son of Birmingham University dance teacher Hilda Norman Munrow and Albert Davis 'Dave' Munrow, a Birmingham University lecturer and physical education instructor who...
's Early Music Consort, the English Baroque Soloists
English Baroque Soloists
The English Baroque Soloists is a chamber orchestra playing on period instruments, formed in 1978 by English conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner. Its repertoire comprises music from the early Baroque period to the Classical period...
, the Gabrieli Consort and His Majesties Sagbutts and Cornetts http://www.hmsc.co.uk/ as well as playing the trombone occasionally for the London Sinfonietta
London Sinfonietta
The London Sinfonietta is an English chamber orchestra founded in 1968 and based in London. The ensemble specialises in contemporary music and works across a wide range of genres, performing modern classics alongside world premieres, and includes music by electronica artists as well as folk and...
. As an orchestral musician he played under Abbado, Boulez, Britten, Davis
Colin Davis
Sir Colin Rex Davis, CH, CBE is an English conductor. His repertoire is broad, but among the composers with whom he is particularly associated are Mozart, Berlioz, Elgar, Sibelius, Stravinsky and Tippett....
, Gardiner
John Eliot Gardiner
Sir John Eliot Gardiner CBE FKC is an English conductor. He founded the Monteverdi Choir , the English Baroque Soloists and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique...
, Giulini, Harnoncourt
Harnoncourt
Harnoncourt may refer to:Harnoncourt is a commune until 1977 in southern Belgium, now in the Rouvroy. And name of an Austrian noble family originated from that place name....
, Klemperer
Otto Klemperer
Otto Klemperer was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century.-Biography:Otto Klemperer was born in Breslau, Silesia Province, then in Germany...
, Kubelik
Kubelík
Kubelík may refer to:* Jan Kubelík , Czech violinist* Rafael Kubelík , Czech-born conductor...
, Levine
Levine
People who bear the surname Levine, a common Russian derivative of Levi, include:-A – J:*Adam Levine , an American rock/pop singer and guitarist*Adam Levine , former press aide for the Bush administration...
, Lutoslawski, MacMillan, Maxwell-Davies, Mehta
Mehta
Mehta is a Khatri Punjabi surname, some Gujratis are also called Mehta.[1]It means 'chief' or 'great' from Sanskrit mahita, which comes from mah- 'to praise or magnify'. In Gujarati it has also come to mean ‘teacher’ and ‘accountant’, probably because teachers and accountants were respectfully so...
, Muti, Maazel, Norrington
Roger Norrington
Sir Roger Arthur Carver Norrington, CBE is a British conductor. He is the son of Sir Arthur Norrington and his brother is Humphrey Thomas Norrington....
, Penderecki, Rattle
Simon Rattle
Sir Simon Denis Rattle, CBE is an English conductor. He rose to international prominence as conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and since 2002 has been principal conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic ....
, Salonen, Sinopoli, Svetlanov, Tilson-Thomas and Zinman.
He was elected for two terms to the Philharmonia's Council of Management and was a member of the Orchestra's Artistic Planning Committee of four, the others being Amelia Freedman, Robert Ponsonby and John Wallace.
His career as a free-lance trombone
Trombone
The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...
player took him to all of the London orchestras, playing in many West-end musicals, including Golden Boy, Man of la Mancha, Threepenny Opera, The Great Waltz, the National Theatre
Royal National Theatre
The Royal National Theatre in London is one of the United Kingdom's two most prominent publicly funded theatre companies, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company...
(Much Ado about Nothing, H, Three Sisters), a run of Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale at the Young Vic, the Philip Jones Brass Ensemble, films – Brother Sun and Sister Moon, Meaning of Life, Oliver, Ryan's Daughter, Superman 2, The Devils, The Lion in Winter, Watership Down and Women in Love – and television – All Creatures Great and Small, Black Beauty, Elizabeth R, I, Claudius, The Pallisers – and touring and recording with the Bee Gees
Bee Gees
The Bee Gees are a musical group that originally comprised three brothers: Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb. The trio was successful for most of their 40-plus years of recording music, but they had two distinct periods of exceptional success: as a pop act in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and as a...
, Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd were an English rock band that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Pink Floyd are one of the most commercially...
and the Beatles on the chart topping Hey Jude
Hey Jude
"Hey Jude" is a song by the English rock band The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The ballad evolved from "Hey Jules", a song widely accepted as being written to comfort John Lennon's son, Julian, during his parents' divorce—although this explanation is not...
.
He was the founder, trombonist and Artistic Director of the brass quintet, Equale Brass. This ensemble, which was composed of Philharmonia players John Wallace, John Miller (trumpets), Michael Thompson (horn) and John Jenkins (tuba), made seven records, toured worldwide, and commissioned twenty seven new works from composers as diverse as David Bedford
David Bedford
David Vickerman Bedford , was an English composer and musician. He wrote and played both popular and classical music....
, Peter Skellern
Peter Skellern
Peter Skellern is an English singer-songwriter and pianist.-Career:Skellern attended Derby Grammar School and studied piano at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He later joined pop groups called 'Harlem' and 'March Hare'...
, Roger Smalley
Roger Smalley
Roger Smalley AM is a British-Australian composer, pianist and conductor. Professor Smalley is currently a Senior Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Western Australia in Perth and Honorary Research Associate at the University of Sydney.-Biography:Smalley was born in Swinton, Lancashire,...
and John Tavener
John Tavener
Sir John Tavener is a British composer, best known for such religious, minimal works as "The Whale", and "Funeral Ikos"...
. Bassano acted as Secretary to the Equale Trust, a registered charity that supported the commissioning of composers and sought sponsorship for the work of Equale Brass.
Academe
Bassano returned to the Royal College of Music as professor of trombone in 1978, he was appointed Head of Brass Faculty and Staff Conductor in 1993, a position he held until 2004. He has given masterclasses at the Paris Conservatoire, Sibelius Akademy (Helsinki), Hong Kong Academy, Royal Swedish Academy, Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney Conservatoires and has been a guest lecturer at Cambridge, Duke, Edinburgh, Indiana, Open, Oxford, Queen's, Salford, Trinity and York Universities. He has written numerous articles for the British musical and national press – including The Daily TelegraphThe Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
and The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
– and presented research on the Bassano Family, Beethoven, Byrd
William Byrd
William Byrd was an English composer of the Renaissance. He wrote in many of the forms current in England at the time, including various types of sacred and secular polyphony, keyboard and consort music.-Provenance:Knowledge of Byrd's biography expanded in the late 20th century, thanks largely...
, Shakespeare and Veronese
Paolo Veronese
Paolo Veronese was an Italian painter of the Renaissance in Venice, famous for paintings such as The Wedding at Cana and The Feast in the House of Levi...
. Bassano has served as a competition adjudicator for the BBC Young Musician of the Year
BBC Young Musician of the Year
The BBC Young Musician of the Year is a televised national music competition. It is broadcast on BBC Two and BBC Four biennially, despite the name, and hosted by the British Broadcasting Corporation...
, European Music Prize for Youth, Royal OverSeas League, Charterhouse
Charterhouse School
Charterhouse School, originally The Hospital of King James and Thomas Sutton in Charterhouse, or more simply Charterhouse or House, is an English collegiate independent boarding school situated at Godalming in Surrey.Founded by Thomas Sutton in London in 1611 on the site of the old Carthusian...
, Eton College
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
, Brass Band Championships of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Yorkshire. He has been an external examiner for the Royal Academy of Music
Royal Academy of Music
The Royal Academy of Music in London, England, is a conservatoire, Britain's oldest degree-granting music school and a constituent college of the University of London since 1999. The Academy was founded by Lord Burghersh in 1822 with the help and ideas of the French harpist and composer Nicolas...
, Royal Northern College of Music
Royal Northern College of Music
The Royal Northern College of Music is a music school in Manchester, England. It is located on Oxford Road in Chorlton on Medlock, at the western edge of the campus of the University of Manchester and is one of four conservatories associated with the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music...
, Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Trinity College of Music
Trinity College of Music
Trinity College of Music is one of the London music conservatories, based in Greenwich. It is part of Trinity Laban.The conservatoire is inheritor of elegant riverside buildings of the former Greenwich Hospital, designed in part by Sir Christopher Wren...
.
Conducting career
Throughout the second half of his playing career he also worked as a conductor taking conducting lessons from Sir John Eliot GardinerJohn Eliot Gardiner
Sir John Eliot Gardiner CBE FKC is an English conductor. He founded the Monteverdi Choir , the English Baroque Soloists and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique...
, Nikolaus Harnoncourt
Nikolaus Harnoncourt
Nikolaus Harnoncourt is an Austrian conductor, particularly known for his historically informed performances of music from the Classical era and earlier. Starting out as a classical cellist, he founded his own period instrument ensemble in the 1950s, and became a pioneer of the Early Music movement...
, Elgar Howarth, Sir Charles Mackerras
Charles Mackerras
Sir Alan Charles Maclaurin Mackerras, AC, CH, CBE was an Australian conductor. He was an authority on the operas of Janáček and Mozart, and the comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan...
, Sir Roger Norrington
Roger Norrington
Sir Roger Arthur Carver Norrington, CBE is a British conductor. He is the son of Sir Arthur Norrington and his brother is Humphrey Thomas Norrington....
, Jorma Panula
Jorma Panula
Jorma Panula is a Finnish conductor, composer, and professor of conducting.Panula is a graduate of the Sibelius Academy, where he studied the organ, church music and conducting...
and Bramwell Tovey. It was these teachers plus his own broad playing experience that shaped his distinctive and historically aware approach to interpretation.
He was assistant conductor conductor to Paul McCreesh
Paul McCreesh
Paul McCreesh is an English conductor.Paul McCreesh is founder and artistic director of the Gabrieli Consort & Players, with whom he has established himself at the highest level in the period instrument field; he is recognised for his authoritative and innovative performances on the concert...
and his Gabrieli Consort and Players on the award winning Venetian Coronation and Music at San Rocco and Sir John Eliot Gardiner for his Berlioz Romeo and Juliet recording projects. His recording of music by the early Bassanos and the musical associates of Giovanni Bassano
Giovanni Bassano
Giovanni Bassano was an Italian Venetian School composer and cornettist of the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras. He was a key figure in the development of the instrumental ensemble at St. Mark's basilica, and left a detailed book on instrumental ornamentation, which is a rich resource for...
the Gabrieli
Gabrieli
Gabrieli as a surname can refer to:* Andrea Gabrieli , Italian composer and organist at San Marco di Venezia* Giovanni Gabrieli , composer and organist at San Marco di Venezia...
s and Monteverdi, Venice Preserved on the ASV label received critical acclaim.
In Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
, he has conducted at the Royal Festival Hall
Royal Festival Hall
The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,900-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge. It is a Grade I listed building - the first post-war building to become so protected...
sharing the podium with Vladimir Ashkenazy
Vladimir Ashkenazy
Vladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy is a Russian-Icelandic conductor and pianist. Since 1972 he has been a citizen of Iceland, his wife Þórunn's country of birth. Since 1978, because of his many obligations in Europe, he and his family have resided in Meggen, near Lucerne in Switzerland...
in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra's International Series and at the Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
in a BBC Promenade Concert and at Symphony Hall, Birmingham. In addition he has made several Festival appearances at Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh is a coastal town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England. Located on the River Alde, the town is notable for its Blue Flag shingle beach and fisherman huts where freshly caught fish are sold daily, and the Aldeburgh Yacht Club...
, Chester, Greenwich, Nottingham, the Three Choirs.
He has conducted the RCM Chamber Choir (including the first performance in modern times of Beethoven's Trauerklange), introduced a standing RCM Symphony Orchestra to an historically aware performance of Berlioz Sinfonie fantastique and directed the Baroque Orchestra in performances of three of Bach
Bạch
Bạch is a Vietnamese surname. The name is transliterated as Bai in Chinese and Baek, in Korean.Bach is the anglicized variation of the surname Bạch.-Notable people with the surname Bạch:* Bạch Liêu...
's Brandenberg Concertos at Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace, in London, is the principal residence and office of the British monarch. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is a setting for state occasions and royal hospitality...
. In January 1995 he was one of the first conductors to appear at the newly built Paris concert hall, Cité de la Musique
Cité de la Musique
The Cité de la Musique is a group of institutions dedicated to music and situated in the La Villette quarter, 19th arrondissement, Paris, France. It was designed by the architect Christian de Portzamparc and opened in 1995...
. He returned to this major Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
venue in July 1998 to conduct two concerts with the Grimethorpe Colliery Band
Grimethorpe Colliery Band
The Grimethorpe Colliery Band is a brass band, based in Grimethorpe, South Yorkshire, England. It was formed in 1917, as a leisure activity for the workers at the colliery, by members of the disbanded Cudworth Colliery Band...
to ecstatic reviews and high profile TV coverage.
A champion of new music, he has commissioned and conducted the first performances of Tim Souster
Tim Souster
Tim Souster was a British composer best known for his electronic music output.- Background :Born Timothy Andrew James Souster in Bletchley, Buckinghamshire, Souster was educated at Bedford Modern School and New College, Oxford...
's Echoes (Manchester/BBC Radio 3), Joseph Horovitz
Joseph Horovitz
Joseph Horovitz is a British composer and conductor. Horovitz's family emigrated to England in 1938. He studied music and modern languages at New College, Oxford, and later attended the Royal College of Music in London, studying composition with Gordon Jacob. He then undertook a year of further...
's Tuba Concerto (Nottingham Festival) and Andrew Powell's Falstaff: Theme and Episodes (Paris, Cité de la Musique), Chris Batchelor's Weasel Words & Winning Ways, Max Charles Davies's Trinity-Credo, Simon Dobson's Four Britten Sketches and Fanfare for Peter, Aaron Einbond's Floral Decorations for Bananas, Edmund Joliffe's Breeze, Gabriella Swallow's Spit, Ivor Bonnici’s Three Movements for Chamber Orchestra and the UK premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen
Esa-Pekka Salonen
Esa-Pekka Salonen is a Finnish orchestral conductor and composer. He is currently Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Philharmonia Orchestra in London and Conductor Laureate of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.-Early career:...
's Stockholm Diary.
Honorary Awards
Fellow of the Royal College of Music 1997Member of the Royal College of Music 1982