The Musician

James Meldrum

Born in Offton, 6 December 1983, James Meldrum moved to Great Bricett when his parents, Len and Di, bought the Old School House, The Green in 1995 after over a year of extensive renovation work. He attended the three local catchment schools, Ringshall C.P. School, Needham Market Middle and Stowmarket High School.

James first began his musical education with Maryvonne and Clifford Evans in Ipswich at the age of 4 when he started to play the piano. His progress with piano was very quick and at a young age had reached his Associated Board Grade 8 along with Music Theory. When James joined Needham Middle School, he decided that he wanted to play the saxophone but was advised to start with the clarinet. This he did learning with the peripatetic music teacher, Pamela Bailey and after two years he eventually moved on to the saxophone. When he moved to Stowmarket High School, James began lessons with Jackie Cunninghame, also a peripatetic teacher for the county council and one of James' greatest inspirations. With the help of Jackie and Rosy Payne, Head of Music at Stowmarket High School, James achieved one of the highest marks in the country for his GCSE and A Level music exams and also reached ABRSM Grade 8 on both Saxophone and Clarinet gaining Distinctions in both with a mark of 95% (142/150). At the time James was studying for his A Levels in Music, Mathematics and History, he was offered unconditional places with scholarships to the Royal College of Music, Royal Academy of Music, Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Trinity College of Music and Birmingham Conservatoire and decided to take up the scholarship at the Royal College of Music.

While he was still at school, James played with the West Suffolk Youth Wind Band and Orchestra and the Suffolk Youth Wind Band and Orchestra before winning a prestigious place in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain with who he worked with Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Colin Davis and Andrew Litton and performed in the BBC Proms in the Royal Albert Hall, live on BBC TV all before he had turned 18 years old. At this time James also won the West Suffolk young Musician Competition in the Theatre Royal, Bury St. Edmunds and was the runner up in the East of England Young Musician Competition in association with the City of London Sinfonia.

After studying at the Royal College of Music for 6 years, James has recently graduated, studying with Barnaby Robson, Andrew Marriner, Tim Lines and Janet Hilton. As well as being a scholar, he also held the MBF Music Education Award, Countess of Munster Musical Trust Award, and the Wilkins-Mackerras Scholarship. James graduated with a First Class BMus Honours degree and a Postgraduate and Advanced Postgraduate Diploma with Distinction.

As an orchestral musician, James has played in the finest concert halls in the world with the leading conductors of the day. He has played Guest Principal Clarinet with deFilharmonie (Royal Flemish Philharmonic, Belgium) and freelances regularly with the Philharmonia Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, London Chamber Orchestra and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. James also holds the position of Principal Clarinet with the Dutch International Orchestra and Ensemble Academy, Young Janacek Philharmonic Orchestra, Britten-Pears Orchestra and the Charities Philharmonia. James previously played principal with the RCM Symphony Orchestra and was a member of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and won a place on the prestigious London Symphony Orchestra Academy.

James is an active chamber musician and is a founding member of the Rigotti Ensemble which has toured extensively, performing classical and modern repertoire. In 2006, the ensemble was invited to join the prestigious Countess of Munster Recital Scheme. He also works closely with a number of quartets including the Harpham, Navarra and Vardanyan quartets and performed with the world renowned Medici Quartet at LSO St. Lukes, London. He has performed all the major clarinet quintets and in 2005 was asked to perform Herbert Howells' ‘Rhapsodic Quintet' by Paul Spicer (leading expert, author and composer) in an inaugural concert celebrating the opening of the new catalogue containing Howells' works. In 2003, James collaborated with La Scala Milan's principal Soprano, Susan Daniel and the Assistant Musical Director, Bruno Nicoli for performances of Schubert's, ‘The Shepherd on the Rock' in the Barrandov Opera House and more recently performed with Elizabeth Watts, Winner of the song prize in the BBC Singer of the World Competition. Recently James has been working with Levon Chilingirian and Melvin Tang performing Mozart's Kegelstatt trio in the Oxford International Festival.

With larger scale chamber groups, James has performed much of the repertoire with the RCM wind Ensemble, National Youth Orchestra Wind Ensemble, Dutch International Ensemble Academy and the Britten Pears Chamber Groups with the Ulysses Ensemble. In 2005, James performed Mauricio Kagel's ‘Windrose' and ‘Orchestrion Straat' for Salon Orchestra to great critical acclaim under the guidance of Kagel himself and more recently has worked with Sofia Gubaidulina in Amsterdam.

James is passionate about performing groundbreaking works and has recently been heavily influenced by Helmut Lachenmann, who he has worked closely with throughout 2006. This culminated in performances of Lachenmann's epic work for Clarinet/Bass Clarinet, Cello (Aoife Nic Athlaoich) and Piano (Hiroaki Takenouchi) ‘Allegro Sostenuto' in the Transcendent festival in association with the BBC, Arditti Quartet and London Sinfonietta.

As soloist, James has performed for the Tillet Trust, and as an artist for the MBF's Young artist programme. Recently he has been a soloist in residence at the Oxford International festival performing works including Berio's Sequenza IXa and for the Charcombe Music Festival. During August 2008, James toured the Netherlands as the soloist with the National Youth Orchestra of the Netherlands Summer Academy, Etienne Seibans and John Adams, performing Adams' Gnarly Buttons Clarinet concerto and in November performed the Copland Clarinet Concerto with the Royal College of Music Symphony Orchestra and John Wilson in Cadogan Hall, London. In 2009 James took up a residency as a soloist with the Britten Pears Young Artist Programme at Snape Maltings.

Addendum

In 2011 James brought the New European Ensemble to the Church for a Saturday night of high-quality music and a Sunday morning piano solo as part of their summer 2011 UK Tour.