Presented by the Royal Academy of Music
Fergus McCready started playing oboe at primary school and attended many musical groups such as the Devon Youth Symphony Orchestra and Double Reed Group at Torbay and South Devon Music Centre as well as masterclasses at the Dartington International School of Music. Fergus went on to study with Liz Fyfe at Wells Cathedral School where he was awarded a scholarship as a specialist musician on oboe and composition. Fergus has been a member of a number of ensembles including National Children’s Orchestra, National Children’s Chamber Orchestra and the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain playing under conductors such as Nicholas Collon, Edward Gardner, John Wilson, Carlos Miguel Prieto, Thomas Ades and Sir Mark Elder. Fergus was awarded a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music where he is studying with Chris Cowie on the BMus degree programme. Throughout his first academic year, Fergus has attended masterclasses with Jonathan Kelly, Kai Froembgen, Domenico Orlando and Vladislav Borovka. This year, Fergus was awarded the principal seat in the Young Musicians Symphony Orchestra where he has performed Shostakovich Symphony No. 5, Borodin Polovtsian Dances and Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra. He has also been involved in chamber groups at the Academy further developing this aspect of his musical skills. More recently, Fergus was involved in a collaborative performance of Stockhausen’s Donnerstag aus Licht at the Royal Festival Hall playing as a member of the Royal Academy of Music Manson Ensemble with Le Balcon and London Sinfonietta under Maxime Pascal. He concluded his first year at the Academy by winning the Leila Bull Oboe Prize and was Very Highly Commended in the Evelyn Rothwell/Barbirolli Oboe Prize. In his spare time, he has been asked to play principal oboe in the newly formed student chamber Orchestra, the “Giovane ensemble”.
Born in Kuala Lumpur in 2000, pianist Julian Chan currently studies with Ian Fountain and Michael Dussek at the Royal Academy of Music, where he holds the full-fees Benjamin Dale scholarship. Julian began his studies on piano and composition at the age of 3. In 2011, he continued his studies under the specialist music scheme at Wells Cathedral School, at which he received a full scholarship. There, he studied piano with John Byrne and composition with Paul Whitmarsh. In 2016, he was invited to perform at the British Ambassador’s Residence in Tallinn, Estonia, and in 2018, he performed Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Wells Cathedral School Symphony Orchestra. He has received masterclasses from many internationally renowned pianists, such as Christopher Elton, Fali Pavri, Vanessa Latarche, Mei-Ting Sun, Ronan O'Hora, and Ian Jones. He has won most of the major solo piano classes at the Mid-Somerset Festival, having additionally been awarded the Bradshaw and Rowe Memorial Cup, the Bath and Wiltshire Evening Chronicle Piano Trophy, and the Western Daily Press Trophy, as well as having won the Piano Concerto category in 2017. An avid composer, Julian had his first book of original compositions published at age 6. He has had many of his pieces premiered by the Wells Cathedral School Symphony Orchestra and New Music Ensemble; he was also appointed pianist in the latter for four years. He has had a selection of his works performed in composition masterclasses led by the likes of Michael Berkeley and Howard Skempton.