Acclaimed by The Daily Telegraph as a pianist of "amazing power and panache", Clare Hammond has performed across Europe, Russia and Canada and appears regularly at the Wigmore Hall in London, and the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester. Her Purcell Room debut for the Park Lane Group concert series was praised by The Guardian for its "crisp precision and unflashy intelligence'. A passionate advocate of twentieth and twenty-first century music, Clare combines a formidable technique and virtuosic flair onstage with stylistic integrity and attention to detail.
Over the past concert season, Clare has performed at St George"s Hall Bristol, the Queen"s Hall Edinburgh, and the Bridgewater Hall Manchester. Her Wigmore Hall recital was broadcast by BBC Radio 3 as part of their "Live in Concert" programme, chosen as one of their Classical Highlights for the month and later broadcast on Radio 4 in the Netherlands. Clare released her debut CD of British contemporary piano music in 2012 for Prima Facie Records, and recently appeared on BBC Radio 3"s "In Tune" to promote the disc. In October she visited Radio Ulster to discuss recently discovered pieces by Hamilton Harty of which she gave the world premiere in her inaugural recital as Artist-in-Residence at Queen"s University Belfast, while 2013 opened with a broadcast of six études by Unsuk Chin on BBC Radio 3"s "Hear and Now".
Forthcoming highlights include the premieres of works written especially for Clare by Kenneth Hesketh and Robert Saxton at Cheltenham and the City of London Festivals, performances at the Brighton and Presteigne Festivals, recitals at the Wigmore and Bridgewater Halls, and two BBC broadcasts. Clare has just embarked on a new collaboration with BIS records and will record two discs for them in September 2013: one of the complete solo piano works of Andrzej and Roxanna Panufnik and the other of études by Unsuk Chin, Karol Szymanowski, Nikolai Kapustin and Sergei Lyapunov. An active chamber musician, Clare has worked with Andrew Kennedy, Jennifer Pike, Philippe Graffin, Lawrence Power, Ruth Palmer, Tatiana Berman and the Endellion, Dante and Benaïm String Quartets. She performs regularly with the flautist Ana de la Vega as the "Duo Dounia", and with the Goldfield Ensemble.
Eager to extend the boundaries of traditional concert life, Clare is intrigued by new perspectives that musicological study can bring to bear on performance. She recently completed a doctorate on twentiethcentury left-hand piano concertos and was convenor for the RMA Study Day Performing Musicology, held at City University London in 2011. Clare will give a series of concerts and workshops at Queen"s University Belfast as part of a residency in 2012/13. She is also in demand as a speaker and has been invited to give presentations at Oxford, Manchester, and Surrey Universities this season. On the concert circuit, Clare enjoys introducing recitals, pre and post concert talks and giving lecture recitals and workshops to audiences of all levels.
Clare completed a BA at Cambridge University, where she obtained a double first in music, and undertook postgraduate study with Ronan O"Hora at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and with Professor Rhian Samuel at City University London. She has been supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Stradivari Trust, Martin Musical Scholarship Fund, Jessie Wakefield Bursary and the Kenneth Loveland Gift.
Clare is represented by Liz Webb Management.