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Huw Watkins
Piano
Huw
Watkins was born in South Wales in 1976. He studied piano with Peter Lawson
and Peter Pettinger and composition with Robin Holloway, Alexander Goehr
and Julian Anderson. In 2001 he was awarded the Constant and Kit Lambert
Junior Fellowship at the Royal College of Music which he held for two
years. He is now a professor of composition at the RCM.
Huw
Watkins is in great demand both as composer and pianist. The Independent
on Sunday described him as “a pianist of alert intelligence and a composer
with something to say” following his 1999 Park Lane Group Young Artists
Concert at London’s Purcell Room. In March 2000 he gave the London
premiere of his Violin Sonata at Wigmore Hall with the violinist Daniel
Bell. In the same month he was soloist in Messiaen’s Sept Haikai with
the Northern Sinfonia at London ’s Queen Elizabeth Hall. In May
2002 he gave the world premiere of a new work for solo piano by Alexander
Goehr. He is regularly heard on Radio Three, both as a soloist and with
artists such as Daniel Hope, Nicholas Daniel and Alexandra Wood.
He has recorded Thomas Adčs’ song cycle The Lover in Winter with the countertenor
Robin Blaze for EMI Classics.
In
1999 the Nash Ensemble gave the first performance of Watkins’ Sonata for
Cello and Eight Instruments, which had been commissioned by Faber Music.
In reviewing this work, The Times said that “at 22, Huw Watkins is already
a composer to be reckoned with”. The piece has been performed by
the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group in London , Paris , Copenhagen
and Aldeburgh under the direction of Sakari Oramo and Peter Rundel.
In 2000 the BBC National Orchestra of Wales gave the first performance
of Watkins’ Sinfonietta under Grant Llewellyn. As a result of this
collaboration, a piano concerto was commissioned for the same orchestra,
which received its premiere in May 2002 under Martyn Brabbins with the
composer at the piano. In 2001 Watkins’ String Quartet No. 2 was
premiered at the Cheltenham Festival by the Petersen Quartet, and the
Brahms Ensemble Hamburg gave the first performance of his Variations on
a Schubert Song at the Gstaad Festival.
The
2001/02 season saw Watkins’ first US commission - Nocturne for solo horn
and chamber orchestra - which was first performed and recorded in March
by David Jolley and the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra under the baton of
Mischa Santora. A Suite commissioned by the Manchester Camerata was premiered
in the same month, conducted by Douglas Boyd. Watkins’ Cello Sonata was
recorded by Paul and Huw Watkins for Nimbus Records on a CD featuring
twentieth century British cello sonatas. His String Quartet No. 3
was written for the Belcea Quartet, who gave its premiere at Wigmore Hall
in February 2004.
2005
saw an abundance of new works: London Concerto was commissioned by the
London Symphony Orchestra, one of five commissions to mark their Centenary;
Rondo for BCMG who gave the premiere, conducted by Susanna Malkki
in March 2005 and Gig , a Nash Ensemble commission celebrating
their 40th Anniversary and Double Concerto for viola, cello and orchestra
which will be premiered during the 2005 BBC Proms. Future plans include
a song cycle for voice and string quartet, and a work for piano and ensemble.
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