By Ellen Wilkinson Will’s desire to compose started early on, as he recalls strumming chords and writing basic songs on the guitar at age four. His affinity with vocal music also emerged young, and after singing in the internationally renowned Trinity Boys Choir he had a range of professional opportunities, including performing the role of…
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Kate Soper and the Musical Chimera
live performance, two-headed monsters, and our complicated relationship with the self By Jonty Watt There is a moment in American composer Kate Soper’s philosophy-opera IPSA DIXIT (2016) when Soper, in her role as prima donna, walks over to violinist Josh Modney and begins a strange assault on his violin. Specifically, she fingers notes on the…
Read MoreRAM’s Bicentenary Playlist
By Ruby Howells As we surely are all aware, 2022 has seen the Academy celebrating its bicentenary. Over the course of 200 years, the Academy has helped music grow and develop, itself producing some of the most significant figures in the creative arts. To celebrate this, I want to create a ‘bicentennial playlist’ which spans…
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Concert Spotlight: The Dias Ensemble presents “Time Travellers”
By Jonty Watt On the 8th of July, the Dias Ensemble will give a concert in the Academy’s Duke’s Hall that promises to be an exciting evening. Five student composers present their unique perspectives in this polystylistic spectacular. Over the course of the programme, listeners will be taken through the twentieth century, with each composer…
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Album Spotlight: ‘Ways of Watching’ Featuring RAM Composers to be Released This Month
By Kennedy Blair Miller Ways of Watching is an album of graphic scores composed by postgraduate students of the Royal Academy of Music, and will be released on October House Records on the 27th of October. The album showcases performers from the prestigious Riot Ensemble and other performers from the Royal Academy of Music. The…
Read MoreRAMpage Spotlight: Ally London
by Kennedy Blair Miller Photo credits: Ben Reason I’ve always felt an affinity with Ally. We’re both from Southern USA (Ally’s from Nashville, Tennessee, just one state over from my home state of North Carolina); we both studied music at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; and now, we’re both graduate singers at…
Read MoreHolistic approaches to instrumental playing
An interview with Nicolette Moonen and Ruth Phillips By Emma Baird Nicolette Moonen, professor of Historical Performance at the Royal Academy of Music, London, is a Baroque violinist and the founder and director of The Bach Players. She is also a certified Feldenkrais practitioner. Ruth Phillips is a Baroque and modern concert cellist, writer, performance…
Read MoreFive Period Songs – an interview with Mia Serracino-Inglott
by Jonty Watt One of the more exciting projects to come out of RAM recently was Mia Serracino-Inglott’s performance of her own composition at the Southbank Centre, titled Five Period Songs. Mia is a mezzo-soprano who regularly performs and creates new music, and who is challenging conventions of what it means to be a classical…
Read MoreInspiring composer: Grażyna Bacewicz
By Emily Trubshaw Although many YouTube comments are encouraging and supportive of Polish composer Grażyna Bacewicz’s music, there is also a wide spread of those that criticise her ability to produce more than just a well-executed musical structure. Rather than moving her audience, Bacewicz is often perceived as being clinical and unoriginal. ‘Her generativity lacks…
Read MoreInspiring artist: Paula Rego
By Emily Harrison Back in 2019, my mum, aunt and I went to see a retrospective of Paula Rego’s work at the MK Gallery. I don’t think I had, and haven’t since, left a gallery feeling so uncomfortable. Yet, simultaneously, so inspired. Paula Rego (1935-2022) is a Portuguese artist exploring themes of, as the title…
Read MoreInspiring doctor: Dr Louise Newson
By Jess Anderson Dr Louise Newson is a GP and pioneering Menopause Specialist who is immensely passionate about increasing awareness and knowledge of perimenopause and menopause, and campaigns for better menopause care for all women. She runs the world’s largest menopause clinic, where she reinvests most profits to fund ground-breaking research and provide free menopause…
Read MoreInspiring composer: Margaret Bonds
By Kennedy Blair Miller For a long time, I struggled to believe my identities as a classical musician and an activist were compatible. The history of classical music is filled with misogyny, racism, and homophobia, so I sought out an alternate history – one where musicians used their art as a vessel for progress. Margaret…
Read MoreInspiring singer: Florence Foster Jenkins
By Jonty Watt If you have ever happened upon a recording of Florence Foster Jenkins’s singing, you might think she makes a remarkably strange choice of inspirational figure. Dubbed the ‘anti-Callas’ and ‘exquisitely bad’, her recordings of difficult operatic repertoire are, indeed, legendarily woeful. Her ‘Queen of the Night’ aria has racked up nearly two…
Read MoreSue Lawley – Broadcaster
By Declan Hickey There is no greater reservoir of satisfaction than the BBC Radio 4 archive, suffering only from its incompleteness. Fortunately, the channel’s enduring contribution to mankind, Desert Island Discs, is among its better-preserved programmes. Better still, the golden age of 1988–2006 survives fully intact, no record or luxury spared. Devoted listeners will know…
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