ADMISSION FREE
PROGRAMME
Lutoslawski - Subito
Beethoven - Sonata no. 8 in G major, Op. 30/3
Frolov - Concert Fantasy on Themes from Porgy and Bess
Julia Hwang gave her professional solo debut with the English National Baroque Chamber Orchestra at the age of nine, performing Bach's Concerto in A minor. She recorded two CDs by the age of twelve and performed with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the same year. In 2015, she became a cultural ambassador for BRACE Alzheimer’s Research, alongside broadcasters Jonathan Dimbleby and Martyn Lewis, and is also a Concordia Foundation Artist.
Julia has appeared many times on live television and radio through the BBC and ITV and, in 2012, she was featured in a BBC4 documentary about ‘The Lark Ascending’ which was re-broadcast due to popular demand. Her latest CD with Charles, recorded with Signum Classics, was reviewed by Gramophone as displaying a “model of expressive purity” (Rob Cowan).
Julia graduated from St John’s College, Cambridge with the 2017 Larmor Award. She currently studies with Itzhak Rashkovsky as an Ian Evans Lombe Scholar at the Royal College of Music. She was the winner of the Senior Award of the Hattori Foundation, and is supported by the Drake Calleja Trust, Talent Unlimited, and the Countess of Munster Trust.
She plays on a Peter Guarnerius of Mantua violin c.1698, on generous loan from the Alderson Trust.
Charles Matthews studied at the Royal College of Music, London, and was an organ scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge.
Charles has won numerous awards, perhaps most notably first prize in the 1999 Franz Liszt Organ Interpretation Competition in Budapest. His most recent solo recording is of Francis Routh's cycle The Well-Tempered Pianist. He has performed for productions by the Royal Opera and Royal Ballet, and recorded music used in various theatres in Spain. A collection of his compositions for flute and piano was published in 2006 by Schott.
Charles teaches piano and organ at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, and is conductor in residence for the annual Curso Internacional Matisse at San Lorenzo de El Escorial, Spain.
