Autumn Concert Featuring Richard Thomas Irish Freemason’s Young Musician of the Year Award 2017 & the Studio Symphony Orchestra

 

Richard Thomas

Finalist of the 2015 Irish Freemason’s Young Musician of the Year Award and winner of the Award in 2017 

Richard began studying the violin at the age of five with Mrs. Loretto Nelson and has since studied with Dr. Fionnuala Hunt at the Royal Irish Academy of Music where he recently completed his Bachelor degree with First Class Honours and Professor Ernst Kovacic at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna where he spent half of his third year on Erasmus. Richard is currently pursuing a Master’s degree with Professor Jan Repko at the Royal College of Music where he is a Peter and Sheila Bennett Scholar. Over the years, Richard has also participated in many masterclasses with renowned performers and teachers such as Maxim Vengerov, Mauricio Fuks and Daniel Rowland. Richard is an avid orchestral musician. Over the years, he has co-led the National Youth Orchestra of Ireland, lead the RIAM Symphony Orchestra and also lead the newly formed RIAM Philharmonia, with whom he has worked under Maestri Kenneth Montgomery, Andrew Mogrelia and Gerhard Markson. Richard is also a regular deputy violinist with the RTE Concert Orchestra and Ulster Orchestra. As a chamber musician, Richard and his college quartet has delighted audiences across Ireland having performed string quartets by Debussy, Grieg, Shostakovich and Mendelssohn. As a group they have worked with members of the Vogler, Vanbrugh, Con Tempo and Brodsky Quartets as well as Trio Gaspard. As part of his final year exams, Richard recently made his solo debut with the RTE Concert Orchestra at the National Concert Hall playing the Sibelius Violin Concerto. Richard has been a prizewinner of many national competitions this year including the Arthur Catterall Cup at the Dublin Feis Ceol, the Critchton and Caliendo Cups at the Sligo Feis Ceol and in May of this year, he became the first ever instrumentalist to win the Trench Award in Birr, Co. Offaly; Richard was also a finalist of the 2015 Irish Freemason’s Young Musician of the Year Award and winner of the 2017 edition of the competition. Richard is very grateful to have received bursaries from The Flax Trust and the Art’s Council’s Travel and Training Award to aid him with his postgraduate studies. Richard currently plays on a 1920 Giuseppe Pedrazzini violin which was kindly handed down to him by his father Philip.

See Richard performing below:

https://youtu.be/GZOUbmAEeo8