The Shepherd on the Rock

Ailish Tynan is generously sponsored by Global Telecommunications

Ailish Tynan

Ailish Tynan trained at Trinity College, the Royal Irish Academy of Music in Dublin and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London. She was a Vilar Young Artist at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and a BBC New Generation Artist. In 2003, representing Ireland, Ailish won the Rosenblatt Recital Prize at BBC Cardiff Singer of the World. Recent highlights include Madame Podtotshina’s Daughter in Shostakovich’s The Nose for the Royal Opera, Gretel Hansel & Gretel for Welsh National Opera, Anna Intermezzo in her debut for Garsington Opera and the world premiere of Judith Weir’s Nuit d’Afrique at Wigmore Hall. Additionally, she was on the Jury for the Song Prize at BBC Cardiff Singer of the World, 2017. In the current season Ailish makes her debut with the Dresdner Philharmonie for Mahler Symphony No. 8, performs, Vaughan Williams’ Dona nobis pacem with the Britten Sinfonia and makes her recital debut in Stockholm with Magnus Svensson. Further ahead are her debut with the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and a return to Grange Park Opera. Operatic engagements include Gretel Hänsel und Gretel and Madame Cortese Il viaggio a Reims; Marzelline Fidelio (Royal Opera House, Covent Garden); Gretel Hansel and Gretel (Scottish Opera);Tigrane Radamisto (English National Opera); Papagena Die Zauberflöte (Teatro alla Scala); Despina Così fan tutte (Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse); Héro Béatrice et Bénédict (Houston Grand Opera, Opéra Comique and the Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg). Other operatic highlights include Sophie Der Rosenkavalier, Nannetta Falstaff and Atalanta Xerxes all for the Royal Swedish Opera; Miss WordsworthAlbert Herring (Opéra Comique and Opéra de Rouen) and Vixen The Cunning Little Vixen (Grange Park Opera).

Katherine Spencer

Clarinettist Katherine Spencer made her concerto debut at the age of fourteen at the Royal Festival Hall and has since performed there as concerto soloist a further three times. She has also appeared as soloist with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, The Academy of St Martin in the Fields Orchestra at the Barbican Centre and at the Birmingham Symphony Hall and Queen Elizabeth Hall, made many live Radio 3 solo broadcasts, and performs regularly on Classic FM and European radio stations. She has recorded the Brahms Sonata and Beethoven Trio for the Oxford Classic label with Sam Haywood and Martin Storey and many of her discs with the Galliard Ensemble, of which she is a founder member are highly acclaimed in the press and Gramophone magazine. Katherine is passionate about trying to recreate the actual clarinet sound intended by composers and is thus an active member of the period performance scene in Europe particularly as a member of The Age of Enlightenment Orchestra. She is also a busy freelance modern clarinet player with the major orchestras in Britain. As a chamber musician Katherine was invited to participate in the BBC Radio 3 Young Generation Artists Scheme. She has also had the honour to perform the Mozart Clarinet Quintet with the remaining members of the Amadeus Quartet in the presence of HRH the Emperor of Japan. She continues to perform internationally with her many chamber ensembles regularly in international Festivals such as the BBC Proms and the Barbican’s “Mostly Mozart Festival”.

Sam Haywood

Sam Haywood has performed to critical acclaim in many of the world’s major concert halls. The Washington Post hailed his ‘dazzling, evocative playing’ and ‘lyrical sensitivity’ and the New York Times his ‘passionate flair and sparkling clarity’. He embraces a wide spectrum of the piano repertoire and is equally at home as a soloist, chamber musician or with accompanying Lieder. He has had a regular duo partnership with Joshua Bell since 2010 and often performs with cellist Steven Isserlis. He has recorded two solo albums for Hyperion, one featuring the piano music of Julius Isserlis (grandfather of Steven Isserlis) and the other Charles Villiers Stanford’s preludes. His enthusiasm for period instruments led to a recording on Chopin’s own Pleyel piano. In 2013 Haywood co-founded Solent Music Festival in UK. The annual Lymington-based festival features highly varied programmes by internationally-renowned artists with projects in the local community. Artists have included the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Alina Ibragimova, Mark Padmore and the Endellion Quartet. He was mentored by David Hartigan, Paul Badura-Skoda and Maria Curcio. Following his early success in the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition, the Royal Philharmonic Society awarded him the Julius Isserlis Scholarship. He studied both at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna and at the Royal Academy of Music in London, of which he is an Associate (ARAM). Haywood has written a children’s opera and is regularly involved in family concerts, workshops and master classes. He is on the roster of Musical Orbit, the online teaching website and his invention ‘memorystars®’ can significantly reduce the time needed to memorise a music score. His other passions include literature, physics, natural history, technology, magic, fountain pens and table tennis.