BIOGRAPHY
Acclaimed by The Daily Telegraph as a pianist of “amazing power and panache”, Clare Hammond has performed across Europe, Russia and Canada and has appeared over the past year at the Wigmore and Barbican Halls in London and the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester. Her recent Purcell Room debut for the Park Lane Group concert series was praised by The Guardian for its “crisp precision and unflashy intelligence”.
A passionate advocate of twentieth and twenty-first century music, Clare combines a formidable technique and virtuosic flair onstage with stylistic integrity and attention to detail. Since her debut with orchestra at the age of eleven, she has acquired a concerto repertoire of over 15 works which she has performed at major venues across the UK and on the continent. Solo engagements have included recitals in concert series and festivals across Britain, in France, Italy, Denmark and Russia.
Clare has just released her debut CD for Prima Facie Records, and recently appeared on BBC Radio 3's 'In Tune' to promote the disk. Forthcoming highlights include a BBC broadcast of etudes by Unsuk Chin and a recording of Panufnik’s complete piano works. Keen to collaborate with composers, Clare will premiere works written for her by Kenneth Hesketh, James Francis Brown, Peter Fribbins, Alan Mills, David Matthews and Robin Walker in the 2011/12 concert season. Clare is a committed chamber musician and has collaborated with Andrew Kennedy, Jennifer Pike, Philippe Graffin, Lawrence Power, Ruth Palmer and the Endellion, Dante and Benaïm String Quartets. She has recently performed London premieres of works by Sally Beamish and Edward Harper at the Southbank Centre with cellist Richard Birchall, and the two are performing a Beethoven sonata cycle in 2011.
Eager to extend the boundaries of traditional concert life, Clare is intrigued by new perspectives that musicological study can bring to bear on performance. She is currently completing a doctoral thesis on twentieth-century, left-hand piano concertos, is to publish a paper on Britten in the forthcoming volume Benjamin Britten - echoes of time and place, and was convenor for the RMA Study Day 'Performing Musicology' held at City University London in June. A committed communicator, Clare enjoys introducing recitals, pre- and post-concert talks, and giving lecture recitals to audiences of all levels.
Clare completed a BA at Cambridge University, where she obtained a double first in music, and undertook postgraduate study with Ronan O’Hora at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and with Professor Rhian Samuel at City University London. She has been supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Stradivari Trust, Martin Musical Scholarship Fund, Jessie Wakefield Bursary and the Kenneth Loveland Gift.