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NICHOLAS DANIEL - oboe
"Some of the best oboe playing you'll hear anywhere"
BBC Record Review
"Breathtaking" Financial Times
"Hauntingly beautiful" Fanfare, USA
"A formidable virtuoso" The Guardian
At his debut at the BBC Proms in 1992, when still
only in his twenties, the Sunday Times described Nicholas Daniel
as one of the greatest exponents of the oboe in the world. Today,
one of the UK's most distinguished and charismatic soloists, he
is also noted for his championing of new repertoire for the instrument.
Educated at Salisbury Cathedral School, where he was a chorister,
the Purcell School for gifted young musicians and at the Royal Academy
of Music, Nicholas Daniel studied with George Caird, Janet Craxton
and Celia Nicklin. At the age of 18, he was the winner of the BBC
's prestigious Young Musician of the Year Competition. He went on
to win several other competitions, including the International Double
Reed Society competition in Graz, and the Munich International Oboe
Competition, where he was the first ever-and only British prizewinner.
On leaving the Royal Academy in 1983, Nicholas Daniel was appointed
principal oboe of the London Mozart Players and, in 1987, principal
oboe of the City of London Sinfonia. During this time, he also played
as a regular guest principal in many of London's orchestras, as
well as with the Rotterdam Philharmonic and the Cologne Philharmonic.
In 1990, however, he decided to concentrate solely on solo playing
and chamber music, and, since 1994, on conducting.
Nicholas Daniel has been heard in recital on every continent, and
has been a concerto soloist with orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic,
the Seoul Philharmonic, the Britten Sinfonia, the English Chamber
Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Ulster Orchestra,
the Netherlands and Bavarian Radio Orchestras, the Orquestro Sinfonico
di Rio, the European Union Chamber Orchestra and the Budapest Strings,
under such conductors as Sir Roger Norrington, Oliver Knussen, Richard
Hickox, Tadaaki Otaka and Sir Peter Maxwell Davies. Additionally,
Nicholas Daniel has been a guest artist with every BBC orchestra.
Since his debut at the Promenade Concerts, he has appeared three
subsequent times, performing Strauss Oboe Concerto; the world premiere
of John Woolrich's Oboe Concerto, which was commissioned by the
BBC; and Benjamin Britten's 'Six Metamorphoses'. He appears in the
2003 season in Thea Musgrave's 'Helios', a work written especially
for him.
Also an active chamber musician, Nicholas Daniel is a founder member
of the Haffner Wind Ensemble, one of the pre-eminent wind ensembles
in Britain. At the request of the Aldeburgh Festival and the Britten
Estate, the Haffner premiered a recently discovered work for wind
sextet by the young Benjamin Britten. The Haffner made its American
debut at New York City's Frick Collection in March 2001. Other chamber
music affiliations for Nicholas Daniel include a twenty-year collaboration
with pianist Julius Drake, as well as regular appearances with the
Maggini and Lindsay string quartets.
In 2001 Nicholas Daniel was appointed Artistic Director of the Osnabruck
Chamber Music Festival in Germany, in 2002 he was appointed Associate
Artistic Director of the Britten Sinfonia, the ground breaking Chamber
Orchestra based in Cambridge, UK, as well as Artistic Director of
the Isle of Wight, soon to be Barbirolli/Isle of Man, International
Oboe Competition, and in 2003 he was appointed Artistic Director
of the Leicester International Music Festival in the UK. He also
serves as Music Director of the Leicester Symphony Orchestra and
is a member of the Arts Council in the East of England where he
makes his home. Nicholas Daniel has been an important force in the
creation and performance of new repertoire for oboe. Together with
Julius Drake, he has premiered works by Henri Dutilleux, Sir Harrison
Birtwistle, Sir Michael Tippett, and John Woolrich as well as many
other distinguished figures. With the English Chamber Orchestra,
he gave the world premiere of the orchestral version of Britten's
Temporal Suite at the 1994 Aldeburgh Festival; and with the Scottish
Chamber Orchestra the world premiere of Thea Musgrave's Helios at
the St. Magnus Festival. Additionally, composers such as Sir Peter
Maxwell Davies, John Taverner, Oliver Knussen, Michael Berkeley
and David Matthews have written pieces especially for him. Currently,
Richard Rodney Bennett is composing a concerto for Nicholas Daniel
and Thea Musgrave is writing a double concerto for oboe, percussion
and orchestra that will feature Mr. Daniel and Evelyn Glennie.
A committed teacher, Nicholas Daniel was appointed Professor of
Oboe and Chamber Music at London's Guildhall School of Music and
Drama at age 23. He served as Professor of Oboe at the Indiana University
School of Music from 1997-99, and is now a Fellow of both the Guildhall
School and the Royal Academy of Music. He was appointed Prince Consort
Professor at the Royal College of Music, London from 1999-2002.
He teaches a mastercourse on Evia, Greece, each summer, attracting
the cream of the world's oboe playing youth.
Mr. Daniel can be heard on more than 25 recordings for such labels
as Virgin Classics, Chandos, BMG Conifer and Leman Classics, most
recently in Bliss' Oboe Quintet on Naxos with the award winning
Maggini Quartet, in the music of John Taverner with Fretwork on
Harmonia Mundi USA, and with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales
under Richard Hickox in Concertos by Michael and Lennox Berkeley
which was BBC Record Review's Disc of the Week on it's release earlier
in the year.
In the first four months of 2003, Mr Daniel performed in nine different
countries on 3 continents, with repertoire as diverse as the Strauss
Concerto in Seoul to the Vaughan Williams and Barber Concertos in
Istanbul, Turkey. Mr Daniel plays Loree instruments supplied by
Crowthers of Canterbury in association with Loree, Paris.
JOY FARRALL - clarinet
Joy Farrall is one of Britain's most successful and highly respected
wind soloists. Her career is diverse and fascinatingly eclectic.
She has performed as concerto soloist with orchestras such as the
Philharmonia, the English Chamber Orchestra, the City of London
Sinfonia, the London Mozart Players, The Ulster Orchestra and the
Britten Sinfonia, with whom she made her second recording of the
Mozart Concerto for BMG Conifer which went straight into the classical
charts in its first week of release and is now a best seller.
Joy is a founder member of the Haffner Wind Ensemble with whom she
has broadcast and toured widely. They are one of world's finest
Wind Ensembles, with regular tours to America and a busy concert
season at home. They have broken down many barriers with their education
work, always led by Joy Farrall, which has introduced many hundreds
of children to hands on music making.
As a recitalist she has appeared at music societies and festivals
all over Britain, at the Purcell Room and the Wigmore Hall in London,
as well as in Spain, Australia, Finland, and Norway. She has appeared
as guest soloist with the Szymanowski, Vanbrugh, Kreutzer, Medea,
Brindisi, New Leipzig, Schidloff and Pellegrini String Quartets.
Festival appearances include Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Kuhmo, Stockholm,
Crusell Week, Leicester and Cambridge.
Joy has great enthusiasm for new music and has had many new works
written for and dedicated to her, most notably Simon Bainbridge's
Double concerto and Clarinet Quintet, works by Oliver Knussen and
John McCabe and most recently Edward Cowie's "Elysium".
Joy has had special success as a recording artist, particularly
as a Mozartian, but also in diverse repertoire. Her recordings include
the complete Mozart Clarinet works on three discs for Meridian,
the Strauss Duet Concertino for EMI, the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante
and Concerto for the Classic FM label, which she performs on the
Bassett Clarinet, and various chamber music works for both Chandos
and Hyperion. Her most recent CD release is a disc of Italian Bel
Canto Clarinet Concertos with the Britten Sinfonia on ASV, and it
has already been well received by the press and played on radio
stations all over the world.
In addition to her work as a performer, Joy Farrall is a dedicated
teacher who has done a great deal to influence the shape of British
clarinet playing in the last 18 years through her work as a Professor
at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama as well as in her frequent
master classes both at home and abroad.
JULIUS DRAKE - piano
London born pianist Julius Drake works with many of the worlds leading
vocal and instrumental artists, both in recital throughout Europe
and America, and on disc. His partnership with Nicholas Daniel is
one of the best known in British chamber music and he also enjoys
close collaborations with singers Ian Bostridge, Alice Coote and
Gerald Finley.
Recordings include French song with Hugues Cuenod (Chandos), French
Sonatas with Nicholas Daniel (Virgin), Britten song with Derek Lee
Ragin (Etcetera), Haydn Canzonettas with Christoph Genz (Edel),
Schumann Lieder with Sophie Daneman (EMI), Clarinet and Piano works
with Emma Johnson (ASV), Gurney songs with Paul Agnew (Hyperion)
and Sibelius songs with Katarina Karneus (Hyperion). His award winning
recordings with Ian Bostridge on EMI (including both the Gramophone
and Edison Award) include Schumann Lieder, two volumes of Schubert
Lieder, The English Songbook, Henze’s Songs from the Arabian
and Britten Canticles (also with David Daniels and Christopher Maltman).
Forthcoming discs include French song with Ian Bostridge (EMI),
Haydn, Schumann and Mahler with Alice Coote (EMI) and Sibelius Songs
vol 11 with Katarina Karneus (Hyperion).
Concert commitments include piano quintet concerts with the Belcea
Quartet, Maggini Quartet, London Winds and the Szymanowski Quartet;
public masterclasses in Amsterdam and Oxford; concerts in the Mondsee,
Osnabrück and Oxford chamber music festivals; recitals in Paris,
Rome and Vienna, the Schubertiade and Salzburg Festivals and in
Japan and Korea with tenor Ian Bostridge; in Amsterdam and Cologne
with baritone Simon Keenlyside; at the Musikverein in Vienna, Wigmore
Hall in London and also in North America with Gerald Finley; at
the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and Konzerthaus in Vienna with soprano
Joan Rodgers; for the BBC in Glasgow with the violinist Ernst Kovacic,
and at London’s Wigmore Hall with baritone Olaf Bär and
Wallace Collection with Louise Winter and Gerald Finley; and at
the Proms, the Wigmore Hall, in the Edinburgh Festival and Lincoln
Centre, New York with mezzo Alice Coote. |
