Staff updates
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Alongside their College commitments, RCM professors and staff members are involved in an array of performances and publications – read on to find out more.
Performances and recordings
RCM Junior Department conductor Jacques Cohen is releasing a new album with the Meridian label later this year. The album consists of Jacques’ song, Love Journeys, written for soprano and strings, with RCM alumnus Susanna Davis as the soloist, and the Tuba Concerto, also performed and recorded by RCM alumnus Oren Marshall.
Programmes Operations and Quality Assurance Manager Helen Cooney recently performed with The Renaissance Singers on the world-premiere recording of Sebastian de Vivanco’s Missa pro defunctis and motets, on Toccata Classics.
Piano professor Danny Driver performed works by György Ligeti at the Cambridge Music Festival in March this year.
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Composition professor Kenneth Hesketh developed a multimedia concert work, Living Ghosts, an interdisciplinary collaboration of live performers and stop-motion animation, which premiered in Oxford as part of Music at Oxford. Alongside this, new orchestrations of selected works by Ravel, including the Sonatine and Mélodies grecques, are in preparation for a future recording project. Later this year, he will also take up a Guest Artist position at the Bowdoin International Music Festival.
Movement professor and dancer-acrobat Desirée Kongerød and magician-singer Christopher Howell will be performing their five-star, critically acclaimed show, Rabbits Out of the Hat, at Jacksons Lane in May. Desirée and Christopher, known as the magic duo Norvil and Josephine, embark on a UK tour in May and June.
Violin professor Natalia Lomeiko has released a new Orchid Classics album of rarely performed music by Ysaÿe for violin and piano. The pieces were performed by Natalia and RCM professor Yuri Zhislin on violins and Ivan Martín on piano.
Assistant Head of Keyboard Simon Lepper performed with mezzo soprano and alumna Kitty Whately at the Oxford Song Festival in October last year, accompanied by live drawing from James Mayhew.
The London Symphony Orchestra gave the world premiere performance of the new oboe concerto by International Visiting Artist, Colin Matthews, and RCM oboe professor Olivier Stankiewicz.
Piano professor Leon McCawley has released a new CD on SOMM recordings, a piano recital album featuring works by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Franck and Liszt. Leon also performed a two-hour solo recital at Wigmore Hall, featuring Haydn, Scriabin and Prokofiev.
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International Visiting Artist and tenor Nicky Spence will be an artist in residence at Aldeburgh Festival this summer. Nicky will be performing as well as delivering festival academy masterclasses to Britten Pears Young Artists.
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Awards and appointments
Dr Christina Guillaumier has been awarded a Certificate of Merit by the Association for Recorded Sound Collections as part of its 2025 awards programme, recognising her biography Sergei Prokofiev, published by Reaktion Books in 2024.
RCM Junior Department Performance Manager John Mitchell has recently become a Liveryman with the Worshipful Company of Saddlers. The connection with the Saddlers’ Company comes through grandfather, who was a Master Saddler and Liveryman of the Saddlers’ Company. Ten years ago, Mitch established an annual grant from the Saddlers’ Company to the RCMJD, and also acts as a Charity Liaison between the company and Southwark Cathedral Choir.
Esteemed conductors Vasily Petrenko and Speranza Scappucci have been appointed International Visiting Artists at the RCM, starting in September 2026. Following a successful five-year term as Prince Consort Professor, Martyn Brabbins will join the College as Chair of Conducting.
Composition professor Errollyn Wallen has become the new President of the Royal Society of Musicians.
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Exhibitions and podcasts
Professor Norbert Meyn, with vocal students of the Mozarteum, prepared the mobile exhibition ‘Music, Migration, and Mobility’, which was presented alongside the Symposium ‘Landscape of Exile’ in November 2025, featuring four lectures and ten concerts, including songs by émigré composers from Nazi Europe.
Violin professor Madeleine Mitchell was interviewed on the Meet the Musicians podcast.
Publications and Content Officer Joanna Wyld was interviewed on Lev Parikian’s Six Things podcast and Justin Lewis’ First Last Anything textcast.
And finally...
The Box Office staff were among those getting into the sequin spirit for the recent RCM event, Disco Inferno, in the Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall.
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Send your updates for the summer 2026 print edition of Upbeat to news@rcm.ac.uk by Friday 1 May.
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