Richard Harwood

Headshot for Richard Harwood

Since his concerto debut at the age of ten, the English 'cellist Richard Harwood has performed in major venues throughout the world including the Royal Albert, Wigmore, and Carnegie Halls Musikverein, Concertgebouw and Alte Oper.


As concerto soloist, Richard has worked with conductors such as Mark Wigglesworth, Case Scaglione, Stanislav Kochanovsky, Okko Kamu, and Yehudi Menuhin, and with numerous orchestras including The Philharmonia, RTÉ NSO, Auckland Philharmonia and Ural Philharmonic.
As chamber musician, he has collaborated with the Jerusalem and Endellion Quartets, Joshua Bell, Gidon Kremer, Yuri Bashmet, Olivier Charlier, Benjamin Schmid, Alena Baeva, Murray Perahia, Martin Roscoe, Peter Donohoe and Julius Drake, among others.

Richard's discography includes a debut disc (EMI Classics) with pianist Christoph Berner, Composing Without The Picture (Resonus); a solo album of concert works written by film composers, Christopher Gunning's Cello Concerto and Beethoven’s Triple Concerto, both on Signum and with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He is regularly featured as a soloist on movie soundtracks, one of the most prominent being Patrick Doyle’s score to Kenneth Branagh’s Murder On The Orient Express.

Richard was appointed principal cellist of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in 2018. He has also been a principal of the John Wilson Orchestra and guest principal at the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, as well as the Royal Opera House, London Symphony, London Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, BBC NOW and RTÉ Concert orchestras.

Richard began his studies with Joan Dickson, before continuing with other eminent teachers such as Steven Doane, David Waterman, Heinrich Schiff and Ralph Kirshbaum. He complemented his studies by taking master classes and lessons with Mstislav Rostropovich, Janos Starker, Steven Isserlis, Boris Pergamenschikow, Miklós Perényi, Bernard Greenhouse, Valentin Erben (Alban Berg Quartet), William Pleeth, Zara Nelsova and Ferenc Rados.

Faculties / departments: Strings


Contact

For enquiries please contact:

Strings Enquiries

strings@rcm.ac.uk

Back to top