Our Artists

Susanna began her musical training with Harpenden Musicale. After graduating from Exeter University with first-class honours in music she studied at the GSMD and University of Cincinnati, winning many accompanist prizes. She was répétiteur for Cincinnati Opera, San Francisco Opera’s Merola Programme, and a member of the Houston Grand Opera Studio, Texas. From 2004-2006, Susanna was a répétiteur on the Young Artists Programme at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.

She has since worked regularly for the ROH, for the Glyndebourne Festival and Tour, Opera Grange Park, the Blackheath Halls, the Philharmonia orchestra, Complicite and the Festspiele and Landestheater, Salzburg. Susanna has accompanied leading singers and instrumentalists in recital performances including Bryn Terfel, Sir John Tomlinson, Christine Rice, Kate Royal, Mark Padmore, Kurt Streit, Jeremy White, Andrew Kennedy, Adrian Thompson, Ailish Tynan, Andrei Bondarenko, oboist Melanie Ragge and cellists Guy Johnston and Paul Watkins. Susanna also plays for Ellipsis – a trio for flute, oboe and piano – and enjoys engagements with them throughout the country. She has broadcast live for the BBC on both television and radio.

Currently a Senior Opera Coach at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Royal Academy of Music, the Welsh International Academy of Voice, The National Opera Studio, and for the Jette Parker Young Artists Programme, Susanna is also official pianist for the Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition, the National Youth Chamber Orchestra of GB and Music Director for the Opera Scenes at the Oxenfoord International Summer School. Susanna is Head of Music for Garsington Opera.

Catalan pianist Anna Cardona is the winner of the MBF accompanist’s prize at the Kathleen Ferrier Competition 2010, prize winner at the Oxford Lieder Young Artist Platform 2011, winner of the Paper de Música Competition 2012 and the Wigmore Hall Prize Recital of the Worshipful Company of Musicians 2012. She is a graduate from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama having studied with professors Peter Bithell, Eugene Asti and Pamela Lidiard.

Anna has participated in masterclasses given by Graham Johnson, Malcolm Martineau, Paul Lewis, Roger Vignoles, Sir Thomas Allen… and was selected to take part in the Young Songmakers Almanac Masterclasses 2011, Lieder Leeds+Festival 2009 and is also a Samling Scholar. Recent performances have included venues such as the Wigmore Hall, Barbican Hall, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Crush Room in ROH Covent Garden, St. James’ Piccadilly, The Forge in London; Auditori Nacional de Catalunya and Palau de la Música in Barcelona.

Future engagements include Rome, Paris, Oxford and a cicle of concerts around Catalunya with baritone Victor Sicard. For more info visit: www.annacardona.com

Elizabeth Marcus was born in Brighton and studied at Guildhall School of Music and Drama where she now works as a vocal coach, staff accompanist and tutor of harpsichord. While at college she won the Raymond Russell Competition for harpsichord, the Dove Memorial Prize for top Graduate of that year and the Carl Meyer Memorial Prize for outstanding service to the School.

Elizabeth has performed at the Wigmore Hall, Purcell Room, Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Floral Hall at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and St. John Smith Square and appeared in concert with Alastair Miles, Janice Watson, Sally Matthews, Robert Hayward and Claire Rutter. She has broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and 4, Classic FM, BBC 2 TV, Channel 4 and French National Radio.

She has been official accompanist for the Peter Pears, the Richard Tauber and the Kathleen Ferrier competitions and for masterclasses with Ileana Kotrubas, Guisseppe di Stefano and Sherrill Milnes. She is much in demand as a vocal coach and works regularly with singers such as Sally Matthews, Patricia Bardon and Sir Willard White.

Elizabeth is a member of the Tzigane Piano Trio, which performs regularly in the UK and has released a disc of the complete music for Piano Trio by Cecile Chaminade.

Gavin Roberts enjoys a varied career as a piano accompanist. He has partnered singers in recital at Wigmore Hall, the Barbican Hall and the Royal Festival Hall, and is Artistic Director of the recital series SONG in the CITY. Engagements have include appearances at The Ludlow Weekend of English Song, The Cheltenham Festival, The Ryedale Festival (as a duo partner to the late clarinettist Alan Hacker), Brahms’ Liebesliederwaltzer as a duet partner to Graham Johnson, The Young Songmakers’ Almanac, The and A Soldier and a Maker directed by Iain Burnside – a play about the life of Ivor Gurney staged in the Barbican Pit Theatre. Alongside soprano Lucy Hall, he was the winner of the 2012 Oxford Lieder Young Artist Platform.

He has played for The BBC Singers, The Joyful Company of Singers, The Hanover Band, Orpheus Britannicus, Tiffin Boys’ Choir and The Guildford Chamber Choir, and as a repetiteur for Sir Roger Norrington and the late Richard Hickox.

Gavin has appeared regularly on BBC Radio broadcasts as a soloist and accompanist, often giving premiere performances of new works. He has played on numerous recordings for the BBC, ASV, Guild and Priory Records. His most recent project is a recording of Gurney songs with baritone Philip Lancaster.

Gavin studied Piano with Andrew West and Eugene Asti at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama where he subsequently became a fellow in piano accompaniment. He also received coaching from Graham Johnson, Sarah Walker, Iain Burnside, Julius Drake, Malcolm Martineau and Martin Katz. He previously read Music at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he also held the organ scholarship. Following this, Gavin gained a Master’s degree from King’s College London. Since 2002, Gavin has been Assistant Director of Music at St Marylebone Parish Church. More details: www.gavinroberts.org & www.songinthecity.org

Photo: Hannah Madsen

Yoko Misumi was born in Kyoto, Japan to a musical family and started her piano lessons very early. At age 14 she received the Second Prize in the prestigious Kyoto Piano Competition. After graduating from Kyoto Music High School she moved to London, where she completed a BMus degree at Trinity College of Music, and later two postgraduate diplomas.

Misumi’s concert appearances include a highly acclaimed performance of Chopin’s “Andante spianato and Grande Polonaise brillante” with the Trinity College of Music Symphony Orchestra under James Judd. Yoko has performed all around Japan and in Germany, Portugal, London, Italy, Croatia and Slovenia, both as soloist and in chamber music recitals. She has appeared in such prestigious venues as Kyoto Concert Hall, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, St James’s Church Piccadilly, Wigmore Hall, Adrian Boult Hall and Regent Hall. In master classes Yoko has worked with Bernard Greenhouse and Dimitri Alexeev, among others.

She is the recipient of the First Prize of the John Longmire Beethoven Competition, Second Prize of the Beethoven Piano Society of Europe Intercollegiate Piano Competition 2005, the winner of the Elizabeth Schumann Lieder competition 2006 and the Leonard Smith & Felicity Young Duo Competition 2007 with cellist Stjepan Hauser. Most recently she won the 2008 Alfred Kitchin Piano Competition. Currently, Yoko is the Leverhulme Scholar at Trinity College of Music, and also recipient of the TCM Founders’ Prize for musical accomplishments.

Misumi is a member of The Greenwich Trio,[2] together with the Slovenian violinist Lana Trotovsek and Croatian cellist Stjepan Hauser. The Trio, a 2008 winner of Solti Foundation Award, has been described by legendary cellist Bernard Greenhouse as the new “Beaux Arts Trio”. The trio won both the first and the audience prize of the Cavatina Chamber Music Competition, a result that was followed by a series of highly praised concerts all around Europe. They are the current holders of the first prize in the Trinity Laban Chamber Music Competition and of the first and special prizes at the International Chamber Music Competition in Candelo, Italy.

The Greenwich Trio received regular coaching from Bernard Greenhouse (Beaux Arts Trio) and Stephen Kovacevich, and has received coaching from Rivka Golani, and master classes from Bernard Greenhouse, Ivry Gitlis and Klaus Maetzl (Alban Berg Quartet). Highlights from the year 2008 include concert in St. Martin in the Fields and performance of the Triple Concerto with conductor Barry Wordsworth.

Swiss pianist Patrick Leresche has graduated from the University of Arts in Bern (Switzerland) with a Master of Piano in Pedagogy before coming to London to study at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. After receiving a Masters of Performance in Piano Accompaniment with Distinction, he is staff accompanist at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, teaches piano on a private basis and performs on many occasions.

Patrick has won the Swiss National Competition for young musicians twice, is a prize winner of the Hans-Ninck Music Prize, has been invited to the European Music Competition for Youth in Weimar and was chosen to represent Switzerland at the Steinway Festival in Hamburg. He has given concerts as soloist, chamber musician and accompanist in Switzerland, England, the United States and Japan. He has performed Mozart’s Concertos KV 414 and 415 with orchestra as well as Beethoven’s first Piano-concerto, Weber’s Konzertstück, the Double Concerto of Mendelssohn and the Concerto in f by Gershwin, which has been released on the label Amos. He has worked together with teachers such as Graham Johnson, Iain Burnside, Charles Owen, Julius Drake and André Tribuzy. At the Biennale Bern he has played the Swiss première of Kepler’s Dream by Italian composer Battistelli. Patrick has worked together with the Swiss composer David-Philip Hefti on several occasions and has played the UK premier of his song cycle “Rosenblätter” in January 2012 in London and Manchester.

As an accompanist, he has been invited to play for a Masterclass of Hans-Peter Blochwitz and some productions of the Swiss Opera Studio in Biel (Switzerland). He has been playing for the singing class of Australian soprano Yvonne Kenney for a year and is currently accompanying Prof. Detlef Hahn’s violin class.

Next to his activities as a classical pianist, he is very much interested in cross-arts projects, which break open the common boundaries of the classical traditions. During his studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama he has been working with Prof. David Dolan in the course of the module Interpretation through Improvisation and has had the chance to improvise and play together with actors. As part of his final exam of his studies he wrote a play about Robert Schumann’s life based on the letter conversation with his wife Clara, which includes acting, improvisation and interpretation. It was shown at the Reflective Conservatoire Conference 2012 and will be shown in Luzern (Switzerland) this November. Another project cross-arts project Patrick has been involved with was the theatrically staged “Lads in their hundreds”, directed by Iain Burnside. The piece was performed at Theatro Technis (London), at The Weekend of English Song in Ludlow and on a live broadcasting on BBC Radio Three.

Ricardo Gosalbo is a Spanish-French pianist and composer. He studied piano at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance with Ilana Davids and Mikhail Kazakevich, then moved to Germany to study composition with Helmut Zapf.

He is a demanded music collaborator, working freelance as accompanist, chamber musician, répétiteur, dance accompanist and composer. He performs regularly with singers, focusing on the German lied and French mélodie repertoire. He also works extensively with contemporary dancers and choreographers and has assumed Mumuki Music & Dance Company’s artistic direction since 2009.

He is currently studying piano accompaniment at Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Eugene Asti and Pamela Lidiard.

For more info please visit www.ricardogosalbo.com