Gabriella Swallow

MySpace Comments MySpace Layouts MySpace Editor MySpace Animations MySpace GraphicsBelfast-born cellist Gabriella Swallow commenced her musical studies at Chethams’ School of Music. In 1999 she was awarded an ABRSM Scholarship to study cello at the Royal College of Music with Jerome Pernoo and composition with Timothy Salter. As an undergraduate, she was Principal Cello of the RCM Sinfonietta and Symphony Orchestras, and performed with the New Perspectives Ensemble under Edwin Roxburgh where she developed her passion for contemporary music. She graduated in 2003 and was presented the prestigious Tagore Gold Medal by RCM President, HRH The Prince of Wales. Gabriella continued as a Postgraduate Scholar at the RCM which was supported by awards from the Arts and Humanities Research Board, Edward and Helen Hague and the John Lewis Partnership. In 2005 she graduated as a Master of Music with distinction. She continued her work at the RCM as the Mills Williams Junior Fellow and now has become the Phoebe Benham Fellow from 2006-2007. In 1999 she founded the Sans Souci Piano Trio with violinist Elizabeth Cooney and proceeded to win the 2001 West Belfast Chamber Music Bursary Award and the Bernard Stevens Prize. In 2002 the trio reformed with the renowned composer and pianist Huw Watkins. Dedicated to the performance of new and rare British trio repertoire, Sans Souci gave the UK premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s ‘A Short Procession’ and were also the dedicatees of ‘A Fast Stomp’, which they premiered at Sounds New Festival in Canterbury in February 2005 and also in the Cutting Edge Festival which was broadcast on Radio 3’s ‘Hear and Now’. Further engagements have included Kettles Yard New Music Series in Cambridge, Cardiff and Oxford Universities, and the West Cork Chamber Music Festival, broadcast by Lyric FM. Gabriella’s performances also include Edwin Roxburgh’s Partita as part of the composer’s birthday celebrations at The Warehouse, the Benjamin Britten International Opera School’s celebrated production of The Turn of the Screw, Tim Souster’s Sonata for Cello, Wind, Brass and Percussion, concertos with the Norfolk Symphony Orchestra, a performance with the Brunel Ensemble, and recently the world premiere of Turnage’s A Few Serenades at the Umea Chamber Music Festival 2accompanied by the Composer, broadcast on Swedish Radio. She is the dedicatee of Jonathan Cole’s Elegy which features in the acclaimed folio Spectrum for Cello. Gabriella recently performed the rarely heard Hugh Wood Cello Concerto with the Royal College of Music’s Sinfonietta under Neil Thompson, Dominic Nudd wrote: ‘Gabriella Swallow is a confident and accomplished performer. She undoubtedly grasped the solo part firmly and projected it with great clarity and vigour, playing with commanding intensity throughout’. She has collaborated with the dancer and choreographer Eva Recacha on Xenakis’ solo cello work Kottos at the Zaragoza and Barcelona Dance Festivals. Other festival appearances in the UK have included Dartington International Summer School with the Archduke Trio, and Aberystwyth, Rye, Carlisle, Lake District Summer Music Festivals and recently the Snape Proms in Aldeborough. She worked closely with the composer Helmut Lachenmann on his solo piece ‘Pression’ and has performed this in his 70th birthday festival in the Berlin Konzert Haus and has more recently in the Transcendent Festival broadcast by BBC Radio 3.. The 2007-8 season sees Gabriella make her South Bank debut as soloist with the London Sinfonietta and also the world premiere of the Paul Max Edlin cello concerto with the South Bank Sinfonia at the Sounds New Festival. Gabriella has been a guest on Music Matters and was one of the permanent guests on BBC 4’s live TV coverage of The BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall. She is also the subject of visual artist Idris Khan’s new film ‘After Bach..A Memory’. In June 2005 Gabriella was appointed Principal Cello of the London Contemporary Music Group.She plays a cello by Charles Harris Snr made in Oxford in 1820.