DANIEL GRIMWOOD

Daniel Grimwood is a distinctive performer with an uncompromising approach to his music making.  Guided by an unswerving love of music, and unshackled by convention, his commitment to great music regardless of its origin has led him to champion, alongside the standard repertoire, works by composers such as Blumenfeld, Stanchinsky, Tubin, Henselt and Medtner. As a polymath Daniel is frequently to be found performing on the harpsichord, playing the viola in Chamber Music with his friends or composing at his writing desk.

His innovative approach to programming has led to such projects as a performance at Falmouth Arts Gallery of the Aurora Borealis Sonata by Eduard Tubin accompanied on stage by an art work on the same subject which he invited his friend, the eminent painter Janet Lynch to create. A performance of Prokofiev's War Trilogy together with an exhibition of a quilt inspired by the music, designed by his sister Emma Grimwood and to be anuctioned for the War Child charity, will also materialise soon.

Grimwood (born 1976) studied with Kent Music School before being awarded a scholarship to the Purcell School in 1987 where he studied piano under Graham Fitch; violin and viola under Sybil Copland and Elspeth Illif; and composition under the late Tim Stevenson. In his final year he was Head Boy at the school. In 1994/95 he studied with Vladimir Ovchinnikov and later finished his education under the tuition of Peter Feuchtwanger.  He has since performed in much of the EU, the USA, the Middle East, the former USSR, and China.

In 2000 he was elected as a member of the ROYAL SOCIETY OF MUSICIANS OF GREAT BRITAIN and, following a performance in the presence of HRH the Prince of Wales to celebrate the Prince’s honorary admission to the freedom of the WORSHIPFUL COMPANY OF MUSICIANS in 2003, Daniel was himself invited to be elected to the Freedom of the Company and of the City of London.
                       
Following the success of his recent recording of Russian Sonatas for SOMM Records with his great friend, the cellist Jamie Walton, Grimwood has just recorded a solo disc of works by Scriabin to great critical acclaim (“His superb control of fingers and pedalling casts a magical spell” International Piano). Together with Walton he was invited by Maestro Lorin Maazel to perform at the private theatre on his ranch is Virginia, USA, in June 2005.

He is also the first European musician to record for a Chinese company, with a shortly to be released series of solo CDs for Foshan Tianyi Audio and Visual Production in Guangzhou, China. Daniel will make the world premier recording of the complete Sonatas of Algernon Ashton, the romantic British composer, later this year.