Boconnoc Music Award recipients the Royal College of Music Vox Quartet in Concert
Enjoy an evening of classical music at Boconnoc House with the Vox Quartet.
As students of the Royal College of Music and winners of the Boconnoc Music Award, the Vox Quartet will have spent a week-long residency at Boconnoc to rehearse, create, and prepare for the concert. you can read more about the Boconnoc Music Award, the Vox Quartet’s bios and the concert programme below.
The concert will take place in the Garden Room, and guests will receive complimentary drinks and canapés before the performance begins.
Date: 9th July
Drinks and Canapes: 6.45pm
Performance Starts: 7.30pm
Price: £25
ABOUT THE BOCONNOC MUSIC AWARD
Each year, a talented group of musicians is chosen from hundreds of students to be the Winners of the Boconnoc Music Award. The award was established by the late Anthony Fortescue and his wife, Elizabeth Fortescue in 2012. The prize constitutes a week’s residency on the estate, providing a valuable opportunity for the Musicians to work intensively on repertoire and technique in the private and inspirational setting of Boconnoc.
ABOUT THE VOX QUARTET
The Vox Quartet, a passionate ensemble comprising musicians from England, Ireland, and America, came together during their studies at the prestigious Royal College of Music. Despite their diverse backgrounds, the members of the quartet found common ground in their love for chamber music and their commitment to honing their craft. They are lucky enough to have had guidance from the Chilingirian Quartet and the Sacconi Quartet members.
THE PROGRAMME
THE MUSICIANS PERFORMING
Born in North London, Niamh Adams began playing the violin at age 6, first learning the Suzuki method with Hannah Biss and later learning with Lorraine McAslan. In 2019, she began studying under the tutelage of Dr. Tatjana Goldberg and in 2020, she earned a place at The Purcell School. In the same year, she was the proud recipient of the Gillman Music Award and, in 2021, was presented with the Lingfield Medal for Music, awarded to her by The Rt Hon. The Lord Lingfield. Niamh is currently studying for a Bachelor of Music at The Royal College of Music, London, with Professor Michał Ćwiżewicz, where she is a John Lewis Partnership Scholar supported by the Douglas and Hilda Simmonds Scholarship. She is lucky to have been loaned a fine Italian violin, a Nicolo Amati copy, made in 1747. In the future, she hopes to travel to Europe to continue her musical studies.
Violinist Emily Ames is finishing her second year as a Bachelor of Music Student at the Royal College of Music, where she studies with Radu Blidar. She has been studying violin for 17 years. Emily was the Vermont Youth Orchestra concertmaster before being awarded a place at the Walnut Hill School for the Arts. She also began attending the youth orchestra at the New England Conservatory there. She currently plays an old Italian violin, made in Naples in 1820. Emily has enjoyed attending music workshops such as Apple Hill Centre for Chamber Music, Ithaca Suzuki Institutes, and many others. She enjoys nothing more than playing in chamber groups with her peers.
Irish cellist Catherine Cotter studies with Amanda Truelove at the Royal College of Music. She is a multiple prizewinner in the ESB Feis Ceoil, Ireland’s largest music festival. She has performed in numerous prestigious locations in Ireland and abroad, including the American Irish Historical Society in New York and the National Concert Hall in Dublin. She was named the inaugural “Cellissimo” Ambassador for Music for Galway in September 2021 and performed for three years on the “Galway Cello ”- an instrument made primarily from Irish wood, which was commissioned for the festival and featured a beautiful, unique Claddagh design on the scroll. Recently, she performed a programme of Shostakovich, Weber and Faurè with Irish pianist Finghin Collins in Cellissimo 2024.
Before beginning her studies at the RCM, she was a student of Aisling Drury Byrne and Christopher Marwood at the Royal Irish Academy of Music, where she was awarded both the Stephen Vernon Bursary for Outstanding Cellist or Double Bassist and first place in the Dublin Philharmonic Junior Solo Competition. She was also one of four RIAM students selected for the Eversheds Sutherland Accelerator Academy and awarded a place on the Young Scholar Programme at the RIAM. She is the former principal cellist of the National Youth Orchestra of Ireland and performed with them in their 2018 tour of Amsterdam. She is an active chamber musician and regularly performs as part of the Vox Quartet and as part of a piano trio at the RCM.
Katharine Wing is an exceptional viola player interested in orchestral and ensemble playing. She is a second-year undergraduate at the Royal College of Music and studies viola with Professor Jonathan Barritt, who she first started learning in 2020 at the Junior Royal Academy of Music. Since commencing her studies at the Royal College, she has been selected for several master classes, is a regular member of the RCM Philharmonic, and she recently played Principal second viola in the RCM’s New Perspectives project. At 11, Katharine joined the National Children’s Orchestra of Great Britain, where she gained a wide range of orchestral experience. Later, she was invited to join the West Sussex Youth Orchestra, where she honed her orchestral playing skills as section leader. She is an enthusiast for the baroque viola and thoroughly enjoys playing in the RCM’s Baroque Ensemble. Katherine plays a modern Roderick R. Ward viola from Cambridge, made in 2017.