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Biography

Amy grew up in Peterborough in a musical family. After studying the oboe under the tutelage of Nicholas Daniel, she was offered a place at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester where she studied with Valerie Taylor. In 2005, Amy was awarded a Foundation Scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music, London (RCM) where she studied with Christopher Cowie, David Theodore and Gareth Hulse. She then decided to continue her studies on the Postgraduate Orchestral Performance course with John Anderson. In 2010, Amy took part on an Erasmus exchange to the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Stuttgart, Germany where she studied with Christian Schmitt. In this year, she was the winner of the RCM Edward & Helen Hague Senior Woodwind prize. She is grateful to have received awards from the Wolfson, Martin Musical and EMI Sound Foundations, and the John Macintyre Memorial Trust.

Amy grew up in Peterborough in a musical family. After studying the oboe under the tutelage of Nicholas Daniel, she was offered a place at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester where she studied with Valerie Taylor. In 2005, Amy was awarded a Foundation Scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music, London (RCM) where she studied with Christopher Cowie, David Theodore and Gareth Hulse. She then decided to continue her studies on the Postgraduate Orchestral Performance course with John Anderson. In 2010, Amy took part on an Erasmus exchange to the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Stuttgart, Germany where she studied with Christian Schmitt. In this year, she was the winner of the RCM Edward & Helen Hague Senior Woodwind prize. She is grateful to have received awards from the Wolfson, Martin Musical and EMI Sound Foundations, and the John Macintyre Memorial Trust. 

Since graduating in 2011, Amy has played with various orchestras and ensembles in the UK, Europe and Scandinavia, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra, Royal Ballet Sinfonia and Det Norske Blåseensemble, and was chosen to participate in the London Symphony Orchestra Academy for Woodwind in 2011. 

Amy is an active chamber musician, co-founding the Armartis Ensemble. As a chamber musician she was invited to play at the Tunnell Trust Chamber Music Showcase in Blair Atholl. In addition, she won the 2011 RCM Douglas Whittaker Memorial Prize for chamber music, and recently performed in the Elgar Room of the Royal Albert Hall and the Chilingirian Mozart Chamber Music Festival. Amy was named one of the RCM's Rising Stars of 2011 and was subsequently invited to perform at Cadogan Hall. In July of the same year she was also selected to perform alongside renowned artists including Hansjorg Schellenberger, Klaus Thunemann and Felix Renggli at the Encuentro de Música y Academia de Santander Festival in Spain. 

In her spare time, Amy enjoys baking, making things, finding good coffee and exploring London.


Education

Royal College of Music
London, UK


Quickfire Questions

What is your earliest musical memory?
Listening to a compilation tape in the car that my dad had made of classical music which included amongst other things Schubert’s Great C Major, John Adam’s Chairman Dances, some Bartok dances and my particular favourite, the first movement from Malcolm Arnold’s Piano Concerto for Phyllis and Cyril. 

If you were going to be sent to a desert island, which three items would you take with you? 

I know it sounds boring but I’d probably take useful things, something that could collect water like a tarpaulin, a knife of some sort and something that could start a fire. Maybe I should just take Ray Mears with me, then he could teach me survival skills!

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