Over the past year violinist Fenella Humphreys has given concerto and recital performances at prestigious venues including London's South Bank Centre, Cheltenham's Pump Room and the Teatro Coliseo in Buenos Aires. She was awarded Making Music's 2005 Philip and Dorothy Green Award for Young Concert Artists, and chosen to be a 2006 Park Lane Group Young Artist.
Fenella received early tuition from Sidney Griller CBE and Itzhak Rashkovsky whilst a scholar (Performing Rights Society, Hope Hambourg Trust, London Borough of Ealing) at the Purcell School. In her final years at the school she was presented with the prestigious Gertrude Hopkins Prize and Guivier Award for an outstanding contribution to the string department. Subsequently she took up an entrance scholarship working with David Takeno at Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Fenella completed her post-graduate studies at the Robert Schumann Hochschule, Düsseldorf in Ida Bieler’s class, supported by a scholarship from the German energy company, E.On, concurrently studying chamber music with Andreas Reiner’s at the Folkwang-Hochschule, Essen. In the spring of 2003 she was awarded the highest possible mark for the ’Diplom’ exam, and in May 2004 the ‘Konzertexamen’ soloists’ diploma.
Masterclasses have taken Fenella as far afield as Keshet Eilon, Israel, the Schleswig Holstein Festival and the Rheinischen Streicherakademie in Germany, and IMS Prussia Cove, in Cornwall, studying among others with Lorand Fenyves, Pamela Frank, Thomas Brandis, Thomas Riebl, Steven Doane, Johannes Goritzki, and Krzysztof Penderecki.
A busy chamber musician both in Britain and Germany, Fenella has performed with such artists as Alexander Baillie, Hariolf Schlichtig. Pekka Kuusisto, Martin Lovett and David Waterman, and is regularly invited to take part in the prestigious Open Chamber Music at IMS Prussia Cove. She has participated in chamber music masterclasses with Claus-Christian Schuster, Peter Frankl, Gordon Back, the Florestan Trio, the Melos Quartet, members of Takács Quartet and Vellinger Quartet and the New Zealand String Quartet.
In the summer of 2006 Fenella took over as violinist with the Lawson Trio. They have recently taken part in masterclasses with the Florestan Trio, both in London and as Britten-Pears Young Artists in Aldeburgh. In addition to a busy concert schedule, the trio has been working alongside the Schubert ensemble promoting their Chamber Music 2000 project. In spring 2010, the trio will be presenting a 10th anniversary concert for Chamber Music 2000 at London's South Bank Centre.
Solo performances have included broadcasts for BBC Radio 3, Classic FM, DeutschlandRadio Berlin and West-Deutsche-Rundfunk as well as various other concerto and recital appearances in Europe, America and Israel. Fenella performed at the Wigmore Hall as a Young Concert Artists Trust finalist. With pianists Nicola Eimer and Helen Reid, Fenella performs regularly around the UK. Alongside the standard repertoire they enjoy bringing lesser known 20th and 21st century works as well as seldom performed British music to the public. Fenella performed a number of works by living British composers in January for the Park Lane Group’s 50th Anniversary New Year Series at the Purcell Room, broadcast by BBC Radio 3. In September 2006, Fenella performed the Walton Concerto at Walton’s home of La Mortella at the invitation of the Walton Trust, to celebrate the 80th birthday of Lady Walton, and open the newly built Greek Theatre. Highlights for 2009/10 include the Tchaikovsky concerto at St. John's Smith Square with Levon Parikian and the London Phoenix Orchestra, performances across Europe with the Lawson Trio, and duo concerts in Korea and Italy with Grammy and Oscar winning bandoneonist, Hector Ulises Passarella.
