Friday 12th September | 12:45pm

Please not, this performance will be taking place slightly earlier than usual!

Iona Brown, violin and Alison Gill, piano

Performing Mythes, Op. 30 by Szymanowski

Iona Brown received her early musical education in Leicestershire where she was a member of the Leicestershire Schools Youth Orchestras for seven years. She won a scholarship to study at the Royal Northern College of Music under Christopher Rowland, Lydia Mordkovitch and Wen Zhou Li. During her studies she won three major violin prizes and also several awards for chamber music with the Laurel Piano Trio, fostering a passion for chamber music that has since come to fruition.

Whilst in Manchester she helped found Psappha with whom she appeared live on Radio 3 and in various series nationwide. She was also a member of Manchester Camerata performing regularly with their Chamber Ensemble and as soloist in Bach’s Concerto for 2 Violins. Iona joined Northern Sinfonia in 1995 where she is now a principal first violin.

She has featured as soloist, leader and chamber musician over recent years. She also performs regularly with the Da Vinci String Quartet and has appeared alongside many eminent musicians most notably Bruno Pasquier, Jean-Bernard Pommier and Maurice Bourgue. She has also performed chamber music with Lars Vogt. In 2003 Iona was awarded an Arts Council grant for a sabbatical in Paris where she studied with Jean-Jacques Kantorow.

She has also managed to find time to further her freelance career guesting as a principal player with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and guest principal second with the Hallé Orchestra. Iona has appeared as guest leader and soloist with Orchestra North-East. Recent performances include the Barber Violin Concerto and the Lark Ascending. Iona has also appeared as soloist in Bruch Violin Concerto with the Charnwood Orchestra and has performed the Mendelssohn with the Cobweb, Tynedale and New Tyneside orchestras. Iona has formed a duo partnership with Cellist Nick Byrne, with whom she has performed a series of recitals, and Brahms double concerto throughout the North-East and further afield.

Iona is also extremely dedicated to music education, and was invited to adjudicate the preliminary rounds of Young Musician of the Year in Manchester in 2017 and 2015 . As well as private teaching, Iona is a principal tutor at the Centre for Advanced Training at Sage Gateshead, teaches for Durham University and has recently been appointed Head of Strings at Newcastle University.

Alison Gill is a graduate of the Royal Academy of Music, specialising as an accompanist and répétiteur. Whilst at the RAM she made her Wigmore Hall debut, filmed for Channel 4, and was chosen as one of ten pianists to perform alongside Michael Nyman and Gavin Bryars in Satie's 19 hour work Vexations, taking place in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern.

Alison has now returned to the North of England and is highly sought after as an accompanist across the region, working regularly with soloists and ensembles that include the Chorus of the Royal Northern Sinfonia and the Jervaulx Singers and has accompanied choral masterclasses with composers including John Rutter, Bob Chilcott, Will Todd and Eriks Esenvalds. Alongside these regular collaborations Alison works as an accompanist in residence for Leeds Conservatoire, Durham University, Samling and for the BBC Proms held at the Glasshouse International Centre for Music. Alison is also accompanist-in-residence for the Berkshire Choral International, collaborating with them for their courses and performances in Durham Cathedral, Barcelona's Palau de la Musica, the Teatro Verdi in Florence, the Musikverein in Vienna and in 2025 for a summer residency in Berlin.

Alison was invited to give the modern premiere of Charles Stanford's piano concerto in B flat, performed at Ushaw Hall in Durham with the Orchestra Cipriani. Other concerto performances have included the Gershwin Piano Concerto in F with Huddersfield Symphony Orchestra, both Shostakovich’s piano concertos and Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with the Mowbray Orchestra, Edward Gregson's Concertante for Piano and Brass Band with Fishburn Band, Roderick William's transcription of the Ravel Piano Concerto in G for piano and 8 voices with the Jervaulx Singers and in 2024 performances of Grieg’s Concerto in A Minor and Mozart’s Concerto no.21 in Durham Cathedral.

A LIVE Lit & Phil Event | FREE

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Lunchtime Classical Recital | Iona Brown & Alison Gill