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HARROGATE FLUTE SUMMER SCHOOL FACULTY

HELEN WILSON

Helen is currently Principal Second Flute in the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. Alongside this Helen has been fortunate to enjoy a varied performing career freelancing in orchestras, shows and sessions, and also as a solo and chamber musician and educator. 

As an orchestral player, Helen has played for international tours, radio and television broadcasts, BBC Proms performances and CD recordings with a number of orchestras. This includes work with the BBC Concert Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic, English National Opera Orchestra, the Hallé, Heritage Orchestra, John Wilson Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, London Concert Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Opera North Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra, Sinfonia Cymru, Sinfonia of London, and the Welsh National Opera Orchestra. She held the flute chair position in West End productions of An American in Paris (Dominion Theatre), The King and I (London Palladium) and Evita (Regent Park Open Air Theatre). She has also depped on Les Miserables UK tour, Wicked UK Tour, The King and I UK Tour, Phantom of the Opera UK Tour and National Theatre’s production of Antony and Cleopatra. 

In 2011, Helen formed Tempest, a flute trio looking to expand and diversify the repertoire for this line up. In doing so they explored music from all genres, from baroque to jazz, and commissioned over 20 works from leading UK composers. The trio won several competitions including the Royal Overseas League Competition, Nonclassical Battle of the Bands, RNCM Chamber Music Prize and were 2nd prize winners of the International Kuhlau Competition. They were also Park Lane Group Artists, Manchester Midday Concert Series Artists and performed across the continent in venues such as the Wigmore Hall, London. Helen has played in a number of other chamber and contemporary ensembles including Liverpool Wind Collective, RIOT Ensemble, Ossian Ensemble, Psappha, Manchester Collective, Ensemble DEVA and LOKI ensemble. 

Passionate about music education, Helen has lead workshops and masterclasses for organisations including Live Music Now! and the British Flute Society and for schools, universities and conservatoires such as the RNCM. Helen regularly leads flute sectionals for Liverpool Philharmonic Youth and Academy Orchestras and for other youth orchestras and ensembles.  She teaches flute at Chetham’s School of Music, Liverpool Hope University, on the pop course at the Royal Northern College of Music, as a Senior Lecturer at Leeds Conservatoire and previously taught at the University of Manchester.  Helen also writes and arranges music, much of which she has written for her flute trio, Tempest.  Her most recent composition “People, Planet, Profit” written for Sinfonia Cymru, is a 3 set work that explores the topics of Climate Change and Sustainable Development. 

Helen took up the flute aged 9 at school in her home town of Harrogate. After seeing a television series about Chetham’s School of Music, she persuaded her parents to let her study there from the age of 12. Following this she completed her undergraduate and postgraduate studies as an ABRSM scholar at the Royal Northern College of Music graduating with an International Artist Diploma and the RNCM Gold Medal Award. Whilst studying, some of Helen’s solo competitive achievements include being a woodwind category finalist in BBC Young Musician of the Year in 2006, winner of the BFS Performance Plus Competition, winner of RNCM concerto competition,  she was a Park Lane Group Young Artist, a Concordia Artist and Royal Overseas League finalist. Helen also plays various ethnic flutes and whilst a student, studied jazz flute as her 2nd study and played with NYJO (National Youth Jazz Orchestra). 

Sally MacTaggart is an award-winning saxophonist, multi-instrumentalist and teacher. A versatile performer, her work has taken her from Wigmore Hall recitals through to the BBC Proms, West End theatre and UK tours.

Sally has performed with some of the country's leading orchestras including the Royal Opera House, Britten Sinfonia, Opera North, Welsh National Opera, Manchester Camerata and Chroma Ensemble. Recent work includes recording the solo theme for BBC drama The Trial of Christine Keeler, performing with the Royal Opera House on the multi-award-winning opera 4.48 Psychosis, Britten Sinfonia’s televised Philip Glass/Ravi Shankar BBC Prom, as a soloist with Manchester Camerata for International Women’s Day, Opera North’s acclaimed production of Kiss me Kate.

As a multi-instrumentalist, Sally is a versatile and sought-after pit musician with the ability to play saxophones, flutes, clarinets and oboe. She performs and deputises in the West End and UK and International tours. Recent productions include Billy Elliot, Motown, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Big Fish, Addams Family, Dusty, Shrek, Elf, Grease and Book of Mormon.

Sally is a member of award-winning chamber ensemble Kaleidoscope. Described as “irresistible” by The Times, the ensemble has won awards from the City Music Foundation, Worshipful Company of Musicians, Hattori Foundation, Tunnell Trust and Park Lane Group. Highlights have included performances at the Wigmore Hall, St Martin-in-the-Fields, Bridgewater Hall and the Purcell Room. They released their critically acclaimed debut album Oil in July 2016.

Sally studied at the Royal Northern College of Music, graduating with first class honours, followed by a Masters at the Guildhall School of Music. She won numerous internal prizes for both concerto, solo and chamber music performances and was supported during her studies with scholarships from the Philharmonia's Martin Musical Scholarship Fund and the Countess of Munster Trust. 

Sally’s teaching commitments have included working for numerous private schools and organisations, delivering high-level tuition to players of all abilities. Her students have gone on to win scholarship places at music conservatoires, universities, junior music college departments and scholarship places into some of the top private schools in the country, as well as being accepted into the National Youth Wind Orchestra, National Youth Wind Ensemble and National Children’s Orchestras. She has led workshops for Live Music Now and the Worshipful Company of Musicians, and given masterclasses at numerous schools and colleges across the country. Outside of term time, she coaches on the Harrogate Saxophone Summer School.