Royal College of Music alumni receive RPS Award nominations

Friday 30 January 2026

A host of Royal College of Music musicians have received nominations in the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards 2026, with alumni featuring in 7 of the 12 categories.

The annual award-giving ceremony celebrates classical music by showcasing inspirational individuals, groups and initiatives and spans conductors, composers, singers and instrumentalists. 

Acclaimed soprano Louise Alder has been shortlisted in the Singer category. Louise graduated from the RCM International Opera School in 2013 and was the inaugural Kiri Te Kanawa Scholar. In 2025 she starred at the Last Night of the Proms and made her debut at The Metropolitan Opera. Countertenor Hugh Cutting, also a graduate of the RCM Opera Studio, is nominated for Young Artist. Hugh was awarded the prestigious Tagore Gold Medal from the Royal College of Music in 2022 and was the first countertenor to win the Kathleen Ferrier Award in 2021. 

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Two alumni from the RCM Composition Faculty have also received nominations. Mark-Anthony Turnage CBE, a composition professor at the RCM, is nominated in the Large-Scale Composition category for his opera Festen. Festen has also been shortlisted for the Opera and Music Theatre prize. In the Chamber-Scale Composition category, Richard Causton has been shortlisted for his piano trio If I Could Tell You.   

Nicholas McCarthy, the first one-handed pianist to graduate from the RCM, has been nominated in the Instrumentalist category. Nicholas was made an Honorary Member of the RCM in 2018 and made his BBC Proms debut in 2025. The award-winning choir Tenebrae, founded and conducted by RCM alumnus Nigel Short, has been shortlisted in the Ensemble category, whilst alumnus John Wilson is nominated in the Conductor category. 

Learn more about studying at the Royal College of Music, the Global No.1 institution for Music and Performing Arts. 

Photos by Chris Christodoulou.