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May and June 2021 - RPS Award, Kaleidoscope debut album and more!

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Wed, 28 Jul 2021 16:53:50 GMT

RPS Award:

I'm delighted to be a recipient of the RPS Enterprise Fund awards (in association with Harriet’s Trust). Many thanks to the Royal Philharmonic Society—your support of my work means so much to me. Watch this space for more online offerings of works for the viola by women composers!

Cowbridge Music Festival update:

We have all been very busy bees behind the scenes to bring a wonderful selection of folk, jazz, classical and more to Cowbridge again this autumn. Joe and I love working with the amazing Cowbridge team together as the new Artistic Directors and we're very excited about the concerts later this year. It was fabulous to have the festival featured in Wales Arts Review in June: many thanks to Nigel Jarrett for the interview. We can’t wait to share our plans with you soon! In the meantime have a look at the Wales Arts Review article here to get a flavour of what’s in store and what the festival is all about.

Thanks also to my alma mater Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, for taking the time to talk to me about my recent appointment as one of the Cowbridge Music Festival Directors and much more too. You can read this feature here .

www.cowbridgemusicfestival.co.uk

Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective concerts and debut CD:

May and June were wonderful months for the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective team! Our debut album for Chandos Records came out on May 28th and we performed on BBC Radio 3's In Tune programme to celebrate the release. You can click her e to buy/listen to our CD! We also played two concerts for the Wigmore Hall's 120th anniversary: these performances felt like a total dream! They were the last of five concerts I've played in this season at the Wigmore with Kaleidoscope; I feel incredibly fortunate and grateful to have had the opportunity to play on that glorious stage with my amazing friends and colleagues this past year. Our final Kaleidoscope concerts this summer were at Snape Maltings Concert Hall. Playing in this fantastic hall was pure joy!

Solo concerts to view online:

A few recent online solo performances I've given are available to view online for the foreseeable future:

Oxford Coffee Concerts

Dublin International Chamber Music Festival

I'm really grateful to both of these wonderful organisations and to Patrick Allen for his brilliant work filming the concerts.

Live solo and chamber music concerts:

I feel very lucky to have been able to give solo performances and play with inspiring friends and colleagues at a number of fantastic festivals these past two months. A huge thank you to Tring Chamber Music, Roman River Festival, New Paths Festival and Lewes Festival of Song for having me.

April 2021 - Cowbridge Music Festival Artistic Director Appointment

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 21:29:43 GMT

Cowbridge Music Festival - New Artistic Director!

I’m absolutely delighted and thrilled to have been appointed as one of the new Artistic Directors of the Cowbridge Music Festival in Wales, alongside my husband Joe. For more information on the announcement and this wonderful festival, click here . I've absolutely LOVED playing in Cowbridge over the years and couldn’t be more delighted to be taking on this new role with my better half. We’re already working hard with the truly brilliant Cowbridge team to bring a festival packed full of joyful music-making to you in October 2021! A special, heartfelt thanks to Cowbridge’s outgoing Artistic Director and Festival Founder, Mary Elliott-Rose for all that she’s done for the festival and for her continued support. What Mary has achieved in Cowbridge over the past decade is truly remarkable and we are so glad and grateful that she will be continuing her close relationship with the festival as Chair of the Board of Trustees. We are both hugely excited about this opportunity and are really enjoying working together with the amazing Cowbridge team.

www.cowbridgemusicfestival.co.uk

Solo CD update

A huge thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone who supported my solo CD fundraiser. I’m really happy to share that this has now closed and that we met the target! I’ll be letting you all know more about how I’m developing this project and update you regarding the release in due course. It’s a long-held dream to have been able to realise this solo disc. I’m enormously grateful to you all for helping me and looking forward to continuing this journey promoting the music recorded. A big thank you in particular to the City Music Foundation for setting up the fundraiser to complete this final piece of the puzzle.

Wigmore Hall and Cambridge Festival concerts to view online

I’ve been so lucky to play at the Wigmore Hall again as part of my beloved Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective at the end of last month. Our performances is available until April 28th here . We performed Fauré’s second piano quartet—one of my favourite chamber music works of all time. On the same day, a project I was involved in for the Cambridge Festival exploring environmental issues, music and poetry was streamed. This video, featuring a variety of solo viola music (including some Elizabeth Lutyens I recorded on my solo disc), is still available to view online here .

The Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective has been invited to perform in the Wigmore Hall's 120th Birthday celebrations next month. Click here for details about the family concert on May 29th and here for the evening concert on May 31st.

Student successes and Benedetti Foundation sessions

My students at the RIAM have been working so hard this term, and I’ve been completely blown away by their achievements. At this year’s Feis Ceoil in Ireland, they were awarded first prizes in the Family Ensemble, Contemporary Irish Music Cup, Junior Chamber Music Cup, Arthur Catterall Cup, Senior Viola and Junior Viola (A) competitions, and commendations and second prizes in Rhoda Coghill Cup, Aileen Gore Cup, the Junior Viola (A) Competition and the Jameson Rosebowl for the highest marks in junior A competitions across violin, viola and cello! One of my students was also offered a place to study at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama in London and another was awarded an Ad Astra Fellowship at University College Dublin.

I’ve also been tutoring for the Benedetti Foundation’s Virtual Sessions this month, working on the physicality and psychology of playing. These sessions are so inspiring and I’m thoroughly enjoying working with the Benedetti Foundation team and participants. I'm going to be teaching on the Benedetti Foundation's Virtual Chamber Music Mini Sessions for Adult Learners in May. To sign up, please click here .

Solo CD

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Sat, 23 Jan 2021 16:26:00 GMT

I was very lucky to be able to record a disc featuring outstanding works inspired by nature, folk music and dance, by leading female contemporary and twentieth-century composers at the end of 2020.

I was so lucky to have a dream team of Andrew Keener and Oscar Torres working on this with me and to make the disc in the amazing Wyastone Concert Hall. This project was a real challenge and the recording was definitely a test of my stamina, but I can't think of a better way to have spent the end of the last year working on these great pieces with a brilliant team in the most beautiful surroundings.

There's really something for everyone on this CD: it explores a diverse range of moods, emotions and colours. I can't wait to share this music with you and bring it to a wider audience. Watch this space for updates on the release in the future! I really hope that this CD will mean these works are better known, come to be loved by listeners and find their place in concert programmes in the future. I'm so grateful to everyone who has supported the disc. I really wouldn't have been able to do this without your help!

Photo L-R: Andrew Keener, Rosalind Ventris and Oscar Torres. Wyastone Studio, December 2020.

January 2021 - Welcome to my new site!

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Tue, 19 Jan 2021 20:36:02 GMT

Welcome to my new website!

Thanks for visiting! I'm very grateful to the City Musi c Foundation for creating this new site for me. It's great to start 2021 with this up and running.

Support Rosalind's first solo CD project

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Tue, 08 Dec 2020 10:27:12 GMT

In December 2020 Rosalind will be recording her debut solo album. She has been busy fundraising, but has a little way to go finding the financial support to make the project happen. Can you help her in her last steps to reach the target? Watch the video below for more information about this exciting recording, featuring works for solo viola by women composers.

For anything you can give, thank you.

(DONATIONS CLOSED)

(Donations from abroad do not need to enter a UK address, just enter your address manually or alternatively use the PayPal option.)

Rosalind writes:

Over the lockdown period I've been working on a range of solo viola music. I realised that several works I'd been playing for my own enjoyment I'd really like to record, and so I've made a little project out of this desire to commit interpretations to disc and highlight some wonderful music--that just happens to be by women composers.

With the help of CMF, I've made short fundraising video to explain a bit more about the project and why it's so important to me. The video also features excerpts of some of the repertoire, taken from my CMF Clocktower livestream in July.

It would really mean so much to me if you can help in any way. It's a tough time for freelance musicians in general and also a difficult time to be asking for funds for projects like this. I'm really grateful for whatever support you can give. Thank you. '

November 2020 - Frinton Festival

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Thu, 19 Nov 2020 18:23:32 GMT

I was really delighted to return to Frinton Festival, joining Andrew Marriner (clarinet), Gavin Edwards (horn), Carmine Lauri and Eunsley Park (violin), Robert Max (cello) and Stacey Watson (double bass) for a live performance of Schubert's glorious Octet last month.

I also gave an in-person masterclass for the talented students at Notting Hill & Ealing School in London in October, and an online viola masterclass for the RIAM Strings Department Virtual Open day in November. It was so exciting to meet so many budding string players at this online event!

In spite of many cancellations, my Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective friends and I have been busy recently with several live-streamed and recorded performances. We've recorded for a future Benedetti sessions project, gave a pre-recorded performance of Beach and Price piano quintets for the Roman River Festival, recorded some Elgar, Walker and more Beach for a forthcoming Oxford Chamber Music Society concert, and revisited the Korngold Piano Quintet we played at the Wigmore Hall in September for a live-streamed concert at the Wiltshire Music Centre, Bradford on Avon, alongside some Schubert and Clara Schumann. I will also make a brief appearance in wonderful tenor Karim Sulayman's Chamber Music Pittsburgh concert later this month too (November 30th).

Playing with these wonderful musicians has made me very happy over the past few months and I'm so grateful to the Kaleidoscope gang for always being such a joy to perform and work with. Watch out for our BBC Radio 3 Kaleidoscope Broadcast on December 11th! On a more sombre note, this is the day that my dad passed away four years ago, and I always find it really hard, so it will be nice to have something positive to focus on then. He would have loved the broadcast.

September 2020 - Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Tue, 29 Sep 2020 15:48:14 GMT

I’m very excited to be returning to the Wigmore Hall this month (on September 30th) as part of the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective again.

To listen live (for up to 30 days after the concert) please click here.

We also recorded our first disc for Cha ndos Records this month. Stay tuned for more on this and other exciting Kaleidoscope news in the coming months!

After months away I was so happy to see my students at the Royal Irish Academy of Music in person at the start of this term. (I was able to quarantine for two weeks prior to teaching). I was also supposed to give a live concert in Ireland, but sadly this had to be cancelled.

The Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective has just given the Benedetti Sessions first ever virtual chamber music sessions (over the weekend of September 26th/27th). It was incredibly rewarding to see so many budding young musicians really engaged and excited by chamber music.

It was a pleasure to talk to Pauline Harding about Vieuxtemps’s Viola Sonata in the bicentenary year of his birth for The Strad’s September issue Masterclass feature.

August 2020 - Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Fri, 07 Aug 2020 15:44:57 GMT

It’s been a week since working with the amazing Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective.

Just after the group had been announced as an Associate Ensemble of the Wigmore Hall last Saturday, we were supposed to give a livestreamed concert to a small socially-distanced audience there. After the government’s announcement postponing the return of live music the day before this had to be cancelled. In lieu of an audience we had this group of friendly furry faces to keep us company whilst we recorded our programme for release at a later date though! (Pc: Elena Urioste) ��

We received a lovely 5* review from The Arts Desk for this concert too .

Rehearsing with these amazing musicians was a joy like no other, and I feel so very lucky to have been able to play chamber music again with this kind, generous and ridiculously talented group of people. I’ve been having serious withdrawal symptoms this week and can’t wait till we can all get back to playing chamber music together again!

Later this month, I’m really excited to be participating in the virtual edition Elena Urioste’s Festival this year, alongside a group of wonderful, inspiring musicians. Check out Chamber Music by the Sea HERE.

July 2020 - St Pancras Clock Tower Series

websitebuilder-hub@names.co.uk — Tue, 07 Jul 2020 15:40:01 GMT

A huge thank you to the City Music Foundation for hosting Joseph Fort and me on Tuesday in their St Pancras Clock Tower series.

It was very special for us to play in this amazing space together. The video is still online at the moment, if you want to have a look below:

Our programme was:

Georg Philipp Telemann Fantasia No. 1

Carlos Gustavino Se equivocó la paloma (arr. Kashkashian)

Tchaikovsky Autumn song (arr. Ventris)

Lillian Fuchs Sonata Pastorale

Lionel Tertis Sunset

Thea Musgrave In The Still Of The Night

Edward Elgar Salut d’amour (arr. Ventris)

I also made a little video for Breathe Arts Health Research on Twitter