Guest Artists
We are delighted to welcome our 2025 guest artists, who are invited to perform in the Peasmarsh Chamber Music Festival by Festival Co-directors, Anthony Marwood and Richard Lester, collaborating in different ensembles across the long weekend of concerts.
2025 Guest Artists
Julian Chan – piano
c. 48 Production
Rapidly developing a reputation as one of the most innovative pianists of his generation, Julian Chan has given performances at numerous prestigious venues across Europe and Asia, including Wigmore Hall, Southbank Centre, Nanjing Poly Theatre, and Palau de la Música Catalana.
Performing music by a particularly diverse range of composers, he has given alluring recitals featuring works by figures from Sweelinck to Messiaen, from Alkan to Rzewski, unifying these various styles in a captivating manner.
Julian has had masterclasses with numerous pianists of international renown, including Stephen Hough, Imogen Cooper, Jeremy Menuhin, Melvyn Tan, Bobby Chen, and Joanna MacGregor; distinguished conductors with whom he has performed, both as a soloist and as part of the acclaimed Manson Ensemble, include Jessica Cottis, Dominic Grier, Ryan Wigglesworth, Ben Glassberg, Jonathan Berman, and John Gibbons.
Recently, Julian has been awarded First Prize and Sonata Prize at the Nanyang International Music Competition, Singapore, Second Prize at the Jazeps Vitols International Piano Competition, Latvia, First Prize at the Norah Sande Award, and First Prize at the Coulsdon and Purley Festival with his performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto.
A passionate composer and performer of new music, Julian has collaborated with eminent composers such as Hans Abrahamsen, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Jörg Widmann, Deborah Pritchard, Elena Langer, and Peter Seabourne.
Julian is currently recipient of the Aud Jebsen Fellowship at the Royal Academy of Music, where he studied with Ian Fountain and Michael Dussek. He had his first book of compositions published at age 6, earning him the title of Malaysia’s Youngest Composer.
Hélène Clément – viola
c. George Garnier
Born in France in 1988, Hélène Clément has learned to combine her proud love for french wine with the cheese delicacies found in England when she moved to London in 2013. Her ferocious enthusiasm and thirst for the chamber music and viola repertoire leads her to constantly expand her musical horizons by performing with a wide range of different collaborations, playing in the most prestigious concert halls in Europe and around the World.
Following her passion as a chamber musician, she has performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall and the Wigmore Hall in London, Carnegie Hall in New York, the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, the Cité de la Musique in Paris. Her chamber music partners have included Mitsuko Uchida, Elisabeth Leonskaja, Nicolas Altstaedt, Benjamin Grosvenor, Alexander Melnikov, Jonathan Biss and Peter Wispelwey, as well as the Brentano String Quartet, the Quatuor Ébène, the Quatuor Modigliani and the Nash Ensemble.
She was for twelve years the viola player of the Doric String Quartet, with which she fulfilled her appetite for deep explorations of the repertoire, from Haydn String Quartets to newly commissioned pieces. They have released together a wide range of recordings, including works by Haydn, Britten, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Schubert, Beethoven and Brett Dean. The Quartet played recitals at the Amsterdam Muziekgebouw, Vienna Musikverein, Frankfurt Alte Oper, Hamburg Laeiszhalle and De Singel, and regular performances at the Wigmore Hall. Further afield they have toured to Japan, Israel, Australia, America, Asia and New Zealand. Ms. Clément is a frequent guest at the prestigious Marlboro Music Festival in America and Prussia Cove in England.
She has released a recording of Britten and Bridge Viola works & songs with Dame Sarah Connolly and Alasdair Beatson, for Chandos Records. This recording was performed on a 1843 Italian viola owned previously by Benjamin Britten and Frank Bridge. The viola is generously lent to her by Britten Pears Arts.
She is a Professor of Viola and Chamber Music at the Royal Academy of Music of London.
Steven Mackey – composer / guitarist
c. Kah Poon
“My entire life was changed by a single note.”
As a teenager growing up in Northern California obsessed with blues-rock guitar, Steven Mackey was in search of the “right wrong notes,” as he often likes to say, referencing Thelonius Monk. The single note in question occurs in the second movement of Beethoven’s last string quartet, which a 19-year-old Mackey heard while driving around northern California: an unexpected unison E-flat that wielded the power to explode assumptions he had about classical music. He would later describe it as the most psychedelic rock music he’d ever heard. Mackey cites this as the moment he decided to become a composer, and it set the young guitarist on a path that has defined his music to this day: Colorful notes (including blue) creating vivid topographies that serve as landmarks on fantastical journeys.
Today, Steven Mackey is a GRAMMY-winning composer of works for chamber ensemble, orchestra, dance, and opera—commissioned by the greatest orchestras around the world, and winner of several awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Kennedy Center Friedheim Award. Bright in colouring, ecstatic in inventiveness, lively and profound, Mackey’s music spins the tendrils of his improvisatory riffs into large-scale works of grooving, dramatic coherence.
Mackey began composition studies at the University of California at Davis and received his PhD at Brandeis University. Upon graduating and becoming a professor at Princeton, Mackey came to realise his true creative voice by merging his academic training with the free-spirited physicality of his mother-tongue rock guitar music. Signature pieces incorporating rock vernacular into traditional classical ensembles emerged: Troubadour Songs (1991) for string quartet and electric guitar; Physical Property (1992) for electric guitar and string quartet; and Banana/Dump Truck (1995), a concerto for solo electrified cello plus a ripieno group of cellists and orchestra.
The decades that followed saw Mackey create many of the defining pieces in his repertoire: Dreamhouse (2003) for solo tenor, vocal quartet, electric guitar quartet and orchestra, nominated for four GRAMMY awards; A Beautiful Passing (2008) for violin and orchestra, an emotional reflection upon the death of his mother that Leila Josefowicz premiered with the BBC Philharmonic; and Slide (2011), an experimental music theatre piece that won a GRAMMY Award for a recording featuring Mackey on electric guitar alongside vocalist Rinde Eckert and eighth blackbird. In 2021, the LA Phil, Gustavo Dudamel, and trumpet soloist Thomas Hooten gave the world premiere of Shivaree, a fantasy for trumpet and orchestra. Mackey further expanded his theatrical catalogue with his short chamber opera Moon Tea about the 1969 meeting between the Apollo 11 astronauts and the Royal Family, premiered by Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in 2021, as well as with his 2022 music theater work Memoir, based on the pages of his late mother’s memoirs and 2022 Concerto for Curved Space, premiered by the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons. Red Wood, a new environmentally concerned work, was premiered as part of The Soraya’s Treelogy Project and Mackey’s RIOT was premiered by mezzo-soprano Alicia Olatuja, Mackey on electric guitar, New Jersey Symphony, Princeton University Glee Club, and conductor Xian Zhang.
Mackey’s music is published by Boosey & Hawkes. Today, he lives in Princeton, New Jersey with his wife, composer Sarah Kirkland Snider, and their son Jasper and daughter Dylan, and teaches at Princeton University, where he mentors young composers as director of the Edward T. Cone Composition Institute. In fall 2022, Mackey also joined the composition faculty at the Curtis Institute of Music. He continues to explore an ever-widening world of timbres befitting a complex, 21st-century culture, while always striving to make music that unites the head and heart, that is visceral, that gets us moving. Learn more at www.stevenmackey.com.
John Myerscough – cello
John Myerscough leads a busy international career as the cellist of the Doric String Quartet. Regular visitors to Wigmore Hall, since 2010 the Quartet has recorded exclusively for Chandos Records, with recent releases including the complete Britten quartets, works by Mendelssohn, Schubert and Brett Dean, as well as its continuing series of Haydn string quartets. They have also recently embarked on a project to record the complete Beethoven Quartets. The Quartet performs at major concert halls throughout Europe including Het Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Konzerthaus and Musikverein Vienna, Konzerthaus Berlin, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and Auditorium du Louvre, Paris. It tours annually to the USA performing in the most important halls and cities, including Carnegie Hall, New York City, Kimmel Center, Philadelphia, Library of Congress, Washington D. C., and has recently undertaken tours to Australia and Japan. The Quartet also has a busy festival schedule and has performed at the Aldeburgh, Delft, Edinburgh, Lofoten, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Risør, Schwarzenberg Schubertiade and West Cork festivals.
Alongside his work with the Doric, John performs widely as a solo cellist and chamber musician. Since 2018 he has been a faculty member at the Yellow Barn festival in Vermont, USA. In chamber music settings he has collaborated with Nicolas Altstaedt, Alasdair Beatson, Jonathan Biss, Pavel Kolesnikov, Vilde Frang, Elizabeth Leonskaja, Anthony Marwood and Lawrence Power, amongst others. He is also active as a baroque cellist and has appeared with groups including Arcangelo, La Nuova Musica and La Serenissima.
Away from the concert stage John is a dedicated teacher and mentor. He is Professor of Cello and Chamber Music at the Royal Academy of Music, London, where the Quartet holds the position of ‘Teaching Quartet in Association’. He is the Artistic Director of the Drimnin String Quartet Academy on the west coast of Scotland and also gives masterclasses for the London-based ChamberStudio and the ProQuartet Professional Training Programme for String Quartets in France.
John performs on a 1587 Brothers Amati cello.
Philip Nelson – double bass
Philip Nelson is a versatile double bassist with a career spanning orchestral, chamber, and solo performance. A member of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, he collaborates with world-class conductors and musicians across the continent.
Philip performs regularly as Principal Bass with ensembles such as Sinfonia of London, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and Spira Mirabilis. He previously held the position of Section-Leader Double Bass with Royal Northern Sinfonia, where he also developed chamber music projects, including collaborations with Maria Włoszczowska. During his time with the orchestra, he performed as a soloist in Jean Françaix’s Bass Concerto and Missy Mazzoli’s Bass concerto Dark with Excessive Bright at the Glasshouse in Gateshead.
Philip’s solo appearances include performances with the Munich Chamber Orchestra, Neue Philharmonie Westfalen, and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, with whom he recorded Cipriani Potter’s Concertante. His playing has been recognised at international competitions, including the International Society of Bassists Solo Competition, BassEurope Solo Competition, the Sperger Competition, and the 2023 ARD Competition.
A dedicated chamber musician, he has appeared at festivals such as Music in the Round Sheffield, East Neuk Festival, Lewes Chamber Music Festival, Cowbridge Music Festival, and Ulverston International Chamber Music Festival. Now based in London, he continues to balance a diverse career across orchestral, solo, and chamber music projects.
Grace Park – violin
c. Marco Borggreve
Grace Park is a violinist celebrated for her artistry, passion, and virtuosity. Praised by the San Francisco Chronicle as “fresh, different and exhilarating” and by Strings Magazine for her “intensely wrought and burnished” sound, she captivates audiences worldwide. A winner of the Naumburg International Violin Competition, Ms. Park is recognized both as a dynamic soloist and a devoted chamber musician.
Ms. Park’s most recent solo debuts include the Colorado Music Festival, Bard Festival under the baton of Leon Botstein, Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall with the New York Youth Symphony, The Rudolfinum/ Dvorak Hall in Prague with Prague Philharmonia, and recital debuts at Krannert Center, Beethoven Minnesota Festival and Merkin Hall.
Future collaborations include her solo debuts at Seoul Arts Center with Les Musiciens du Louvre with Marc Minkowski, Sarasota Orchestra with Peter Oundjian, Orlando Philharmonic with Eric Jacobsen, along with chamber music debuts at the Savannah Music Festival and Camerata Pacifica.
Ms. Park recorded her debut solo album with the Prague Philharmonia and their music director, Emmanuel Villaume, which will include concertos and solo works of Mozart and Dvorak. It is set to be released in the spring of 2025.
A devoted and passionate educator, Ms. Park is an alumnus of Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect and has taught masterclasses and coached at Conservatorio de Musica de Cartagena, Mannes School of Music, University of North Carolina, University of Mississippi, Washington and Lee University, North Dakota State University, Skidmore College, among others. She currently teaches as adjunct professor at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University.
As a native to Los Angeles, California, Ms. Park began violin at the age of 5 where she trained at the Colburn School of Music. She continued her studies at Colburn Conservatory and New England Conservatory for her Bachelor and Master of Music degrees. Principal teachers are Donald Weilerstein, Miriam Fried, Sylvia Rosenberg, and Robert Lipsett. She now resides in New York City.
She performs on a 1717 Giuseppe Filius Andrea Guarneri on loan from an anonymous sponsor.
Shai Wosner – piano
c. Marco Borggreve
Pianist Shai Wosner has attracted international recognition for his exceptional artistry, musical integrity, and creative insight. His performances of a broad range of repertoire—from Beethoven and Schubert to Ligeti and the music of today—reflect a degree of virtuosity and intellectual curiosity that has made him a favorite among audiences and critics, who note his “keen musical mind and deep musical soul” (NPR’s All Things Considered).
Recently, Wosner has given the world premiere of Vijay Iyer’s Piano Concerto ‘Handmade Universe’ which was written for him and ECCO (East Coast Chamber Orchestra) with whom he has enjoyed a longstanding relationship. The concerto highlights his commitment to performing works by contemporary composers and his ongoing relationship with Iyer, whose piece, Plinth, was part of Shai’s multi-composer project – Variations on a Theme of FDR. Following the premiere of Iyer’s piano concerto in New York, Wosner gives the Philadelphia premiere with the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society.
Additional upcoming and recent include highlights include a U.S. tour with Martin Fröst and Antoine Tamestit in a program that includes the many of Shai’s arrangements made especially for the group, Schoenberg’s Piano Concerto with the Symphoniker Hamburg, multiple performances at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, various solo recitals and tours with Joshua Bell and as part of the Zukerman Trio with violinist Pinchas Zukerman and cellist Amanda Forsyth.
In recent years, Wosner’s arrangements of various Beethoven Symphonies for piano trio have been premiered and toured in the U.S. and Europe by Emanuel Ax, Leonidas Kavakos and Yo-Yo Ma and are available in GRAMMY-nominated recordings released by Sony Classical.
Wosner’s latest album, a recording of Wosner’s performance of Beethoven’s 33 Variations on a Waltz by Anton Diabelli, Op. 120, was released on Onyx Classics. This recording serves as the companion to Wosner’s 2022 recording for New Focus of the aforementioned Variations on a Theme of FDR. The Diabelli Variations had inspired Wosner to commission five contemporary composers—Derek Bermel, Anthony Cheung, John Harbison, Vijay Iyer, and Wang Lu—to create a work based on a quote from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s 1938 address to the Daughters of the American Revolution: “Remember, remember always, that all of us… are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.” In the 2022-23 Season, Wosner paired Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations with Variations on a Theme of FDR in various recitals. The project was commissioned by People’s Symphony Concerts where he was Artist-in-Residence in 2020-2025 and The Philadelphia Chamber Music Society.
Other recent recordings from Wosner also include The Air Suspended, on which Wosner performs Christopher Cerrone’s concerto for piano and strings with the Argus Quartet and bassist Pat Swoboda, released on New Focus. In 2020 Wosner released a selection of Schubert piano sonatas continuing his career-long, critically acclaimed engagement with the composer’s music. This double album, released by Onyx Classics, completes Wosner’s recorded series of the composer’s last six sonatas, which he has also performed as a recital series. Additional recordings include Impromptu, comprising improvisationally inspired works by composers from Beethoven and Schubert to Gershwin and Ives; concertos and capriccios by Haydn and Ligeti with the Danish National Symphony conducted by Nicholas Collon; an all-Schubert solo album featuring a selection of the composer’s folk-inspired piano works; solo works by Brahms and Schoenberg; and works by Schubert paired with new works by Missy Mazzoli. As a chamber musician, Wosner has recorded Beethoven’s complete sonatas and variations for cello and piano with Ralph Kirshbaum and—for Cedille Records—works by Bartók, Janáček, and Kurtág with violinist Jennifer Koh.
Wosner is a recipient of Lincoln Center’s Martin E. Segal Award, an Avery Fisher Career Grant, and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award—a prize he used to commission Michael Hersch’s concerto Along the Ravines, which he performed with the Seattle Symphony and Deutsche Radio Philharmonie in its world and European premieres. He was in residence with the BBC as a New Generation Artist, during which he appeared frequently with the BBC orchestras, including conducting Mozart concertos from the keyboard with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. He returned to the BBC Scottish Symphony in both subscription concerts and Proms performances with Donald Runnicles and appeared with the BBC Philharmonic in a live broadcast from Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall. As a concerto soloist in North America, Wosner has appeared with the major orchestras of Atlanta, Baltimore, Berkeley, Chicago, Cleveland, Dallas, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Ottawa, San Francisco, St. Louis, and Toronto, among others. In addition to the BBC orchestras, he has performed abroad with the Aurora Orchestra, Barcelona Symphony, Bournemouth Symphony, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Gothenburg Symphony, LSO St. Luke’s, Nieuw Sinfonietta Amsterdam, Orchestre National de Belgique, Staatskapelle Berlin, and the Vienna Philharmonic, among others. Wosner has also appeared with the Orpheus, St. Paul, and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestras, having conducted the latter from the keyboard in a 2010 concert that was broadcast on American Public Radio. Recently, he toured with ECCO to Memphis, Philadelphia, and New York for the world-premiere performances of Christopher Cerrone’s piano concerto The Air Suspended.
Wosner has worked with such conductors as Daniel Barenboim, Jiří Bělohlávek, James Conlon, Alan Gilbert, Gunther Herbig, James Judd, Zubin Mehta, Peter Oundjian, Donald Runnicles, Leonard Slatkin, Jeffrey Tate, and Yan Pascal Tortelier, and has performed at summer festivals including the Bowdoin International Music Festival, Chautauqua Music Festival, Bravo! Vail festival, Grand Teton Music Festival, Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center, and Ravinia Festival. For several consecutive summers, he was involved in the West-Eastern Divan Workshop led by Barenboim and toured as soloist with the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.
Widely sought after by colleagues for his versatility and spirit of partnership, Wosner has collaborated as a chamber musician with numerous artists, including Martha Argerich, Martin Fröst, Lynn Harrell, Dietrich Henschel, Ralph Kirshbaum, Jennifer Koh, Cho-Liang Lin, Christian Tetzlaff, Orion Weiss, and Pinchas Zukerman. He has also collaborated with leading chamber ensembles, including the Grammy Award-winning Parker Quartet in The Schubert Effect recital series. Wosner is a past member of Lincoln Center’s Bowers Program (formerly CMS Two) and performs regularly at various chamber music festivals, including Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Jerusalem Chamber Music Festival, Oregon Bach Festival, Piano Aux Jacobins festival in France, and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival.
Born in Israel, Wosner enjoyed a broad musical education from a very early age, studying piano with Opher Brayer and Emanuel Krasovsky, as well as composition, theory, and improvisation with André Hajdu. He later studied with Emanuel Ax at The Juilliard School, where Wosner is also now on the piano faculty. He resides in New York with his wife and two children.
For more information on Mr. Wosner, please visit his Facebook fan page, follow him on Twitter ( @ShaiWosnerPiano ), and go to shaiwosner.com .
Lumas Winds
Beth Stone, flute- Ewan Millar, oboe
- Benjamin Hartnell-Booth, French horn
- Flo Plane, bassoon
- Rennie Sutherland, clarinet
Beth Stone, fluteLumas Winds are committed ambassadors for wind chamber music and the rich variety of repertoire it offers. As winners of numerous prizes, regularly featuring at festivals and music clubs up and down the UK, they have firmly established themselves as a group to watch and have been described as an ‘effervescent wind quintet, lively in their performance style and enterprising in their choice of repertoire’ (Seen and Heard International).
The ensemble released their debut album, The Naming of Birds, in May 2024 for Champs Hill records. The disc highlights their passion as advocates for works that deserve recognition and was described by Andrew McGregor as ‘an excellent and highly enjoyable survey of the British wind quintet from the early 1960s into this century’ (BBC Radio 3, Record Review). Six hidden gems feature from each decade from 1960 to 2010 including three world premiere recordings by Beamish, Higgins, and Maconchy. Prior to recording, the group won the Royal Academy of Music’s Historical Women Composers Prize for a performance of the Elizabeth Maconchy Wind Quintet (1980).
They are currently featured young artists with the Countess of Munster Recital Scheme as well as the Kirckman Concerts Society. The latter of which will see them make their King’s Place debut in May 2025. Prior to this the group were Tunnell Trust Young Artists, taking them on a tour of Scottish music clubs in February 2024; Britten Pears Young Artists, which provided them with a week long residency in Snape Maltings, exploring various contemporary works with the Montreal based Qautuor Bozzini, as well as the performance of a newly commissioned work by composer Marcello Palazzo; and Philip and Dorothy Green Young Artists through Making Music.
The group has featured at the Corbridge, Ironstone, Winchester, and Lake District chamber music festivals – this has included performances of Poulenc’s Sextet alongside Benjamin Frith and Huw Watkins as well as collaborations with other esteemed musicians like Lucy and Kate Gould, Ralph de Souza, and Rosalind Ventris. They made their Wigmore Hall debut in June 2023 with an energised performance of Lalo Schifrin’s La Nouvelle Orleans.
Lumas evolved through friendships formed at the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, with the ensemble being established in 2018. This has resulted in a strong bond between its members, carrying the group forward with confidence in its shared vision. The group presents diverse and varied programmes, framing lesser known works alongside classics of the canon, and their concerts embrace verbal introductions which illuminate the thinking behind their fresh and eclectic approach. Their chemistry on stage was highlighted as winners of the 71st Royal Over-Seas League Mixed Ensemble Prize.
Upcoming engagements include concerts at St Hilda’s Oxford and the Dorset Museum Music Society as well as a busy summer schedule visiting the Budleigh, Gower, and Peasmarsh music festivals.
Website: www.lumaswinds.com
Britten Sinfonia
c. Mark Allan
Britten Sinfonia is a different kind of orchestra. It is defined not by the traditional figurehead of a principal conductor, but by the dynamic and democratic meeting of its outstanding individual players and the broad range of their collaborators – from Steve Reich, Thomas Adès and Alison Balsom to
Pagrav Dance Company, Jacob Collier and Anoushka Shankar.
Rooted in the East of England, where it is the only professional orchestra working throughout the region, Britten Sinfonia also has a national and international reputation as one of today’s finest ensembles. It is renowned for its adventurous programming and stunningly high-quality performances, and equally for its record of commissioning new music, nurturing new composing talent, and inspiring schoolchildren, hospital patients and communities across the East of England.
Britten Sinfonia’s main touring locations are in London, Saffron Walden, Cambridge and Norwich. The orchestra also performs regularly at London’s Wigmore Hall and appears at UK festivals including Aldeburgh, Brighton, Norfolk & Norwich and the BBC Proms. Its prolific discography features many award-winning recordings.
Website: www.brittensinfonia.com