About Isata Kanneh-Mason, piano
Pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason is in great demand internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. She offers eclectic and interesting repertoire with recital programs encompassing music from Haydn and Mozart via Fanny Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann, Chopin and Brahms to Gershwin and beyond. In concerto, she is equally at home in Felix Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann (whose piano concerto featured on Kanneh-Mason’s chart-topping debut recording) as in Prokofiev and Dohnányi.
Highlights of her recent season include performances with the Philadelphia Orchestra, National Arts Centre Orchestra Ottawa, London Mozart Players, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on tour in the USA and Germany, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Cleveland Orchestra, Toronto Symphony and Stockholm Philharmonic. With her cellist brother, Sheku, she appears in recital in Japan, Singapore and South Korea in addition to an extensive European recital tour. Kanneh-Mason also gives a series of solo recitals on tour in the USA and Canada as well as at London’s Wigmore Hall, the Lucerne Festival and across Germany.
Last year, Kanneh-Mason made successful debuts at the Barbican, Queen Elizabeth and Wigmore halls in London, the Philharmonie Berlin, National Concert Hall Dublin, Perth Concert Hall, Prinzregententheater Munich and Royal Albert Hall, alongside Ryan Bancroft and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. As concerto soloist, she appeared with orchestras such as the New World Symphony Miami, City of Birmingham Symphony, Barcelona Symphony, Geneva Chamber Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic and was the Artist in Residence with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Kanneh-Mason is a Decca Classics recording artist. Her 2019 album, Romance – the Piano Music of Clara Schumann, entered the UK classical charts at No. 1, Gramophone magazine extolling the recording as “one of the most charming and engaging debuts.” This was followed by 2021’s Summertime, featuring 20th-century American repertoire including a world premiere recording of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Impromptu in B minor and 2023’s endearingly titled album Childhood Tales is a tour-de-force showcase of music inspired by a nostalgia for youth.
Kanneh-Mason released her first duo album, Muse, with her brother Sheku in 2021, demonstrating the siblings’ musical empathy and rapport borne from years of playing and performing together. Kanneh-Mason was an ECHO Rising Star in 2022, the recipient of the coveted Leonard Bernstein Award and an Opus Klassik award for best young artist.
About Sheku Kanneh-Mason, cello
Cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason’s career and performances span the globe. Whether performing for children in a school hall, at an underground club or in the world’s leading concert venues, Kanneh-Mason’s mission is to make music accessible to all. After winning the BBC Young Musician competition in 2016, his performance at the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex at Windsor Castle in 2018 was watched by two billion people worldwide.
Highlights of the last season include the Last Night of the Proms with the BBC Symphony and Marin Alsop, performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Orquesta Nacional de España, National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, Oslo Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, Gävle Symphony, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic on tour in Germany, Cincinnati Symphony, New York Philharmonic, Detroit Symphony and San Francisco Symphony. With his sister, Isata, he appeared in recital in Japan, Singapore and South Korea in addition to an extensive European recital tour. Kanneh-Mason performed a series of duo recitals with guitarist Plínio Fernandes as well as continuing his solo cello recital tour in the USA and Canada. He returned to Antigua, where he has family connections, as an ambassador for the Antigua and Barbuda Youth Symphony Orchestra. Since his debut in 2017, Kanneh-Mason has performed every summer at the BBC Proms, including in 2020 when he gave a breath-taking recital performance with his sister Isata, to an empty auditorium due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
A Decca Classics recording artist, his 2022 album, Song, showcases his innately lyrical playing in a wide and varied range of arrangements and collaborations. Kanneh-Mason’s 2020 album Elgar reached No. 8 in the overall Official UK Album Chart, making him the first ever cellist to reach the UK Top 10. Sheet music collections of his performance repertoire along with his own arrangements and compositions are published by Faber.
Kanneh-Mason is a graduate of London’s Royal Academy of Music where he studied with Hannah Roberts and in 2022 was appointed as the Academy’s first Menuhin Visiting Professor of Performance Mentoring. He is an ambassador for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Future Talent and Music Masters. Kanneh-Mason was appointed a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2020 New Year’s Honours List. He plays a Matteo Goffriller cello from 1700 which is on indefinite loan to him.