MINEHEAD & EXMOOR FESTIVAL

Artistic Director Richard Dickins

RICHARD DICKINS, a graduate of the Royal College of Music London where he was an Exhibitioner and prizewinner, studied conducting with Norman Del Mar.  He subsequently worked as Del Mar’s assistant on many occasions with orchestras such as the Philharmonia, Royal Philharmonic and Bournemouth Symphony.  He has gained a well-deserved reputation for his high degree of sympathetic rapport with concerto soloists and this has led him to work with some of the UK’s finest musicians including Raphael Wallfisch, James Bowman, Christopher Cowie, John Harle, Noriko Ogawa and Philip Dukes.  In 1983 he made his Italian conducting debut with performances of Walton’s Façade with the Lindsay Kemp Dance Company for La Scala at the Teatro Nuovo in Milan, following which he took the production on tour throughout Italy. Later that year he was invited to conduct further productions in London at Sadler’s Wells and in Edinburgh for the Festival.  Since then he has had a busy schedule working with orchestras throughout the UK and abroad.

In 1992 he made a highly acclaimed first appearance in Hungary conducting Verdi’s Requiem at the Liszt Academy in Budapest.  In 1994 he was the London Chorus Master for the World Festival Choir’s performance of the Verdi Requiem with Luciano Pavarotti and in 1995 he made a successful debut with the Ulster Orchestra.  He is founder conductor of the string orchestra London Concertino with whom he was recently invited by the UAE Ambassador to perform at the celebrations to mark Arab National day.  His commitment to contemporary music has led to his being invited to conduct a number of first performances including works by John Woolrich, Timothy Salter, John Madden, William Mival and Peter Hope.

Richard Dickins is well known for his work with young musicians.  He became conductor of the Symphony Orchestra at Imperial College London whilst still a student and was later appointed the College’s first Musician-in Residence.  He is also principal conductor at the Royal College of Music Junior Department.  He was recently elected to honorary membership of the RCM and was presented with this honour by the Prince of Wales.

For more than two decades Richard has been artistic director of the Minehead and Exmoor Festival – a week long series of orchestral concerts in the West Country featuring well known soloists and with professional players drawn from all over the UK.

Richard Dickins has appeared on BBC TV and national and local radio as well as Classic FM. In December 2002 he was featured in an episode of the Channel 4 series Faking It in which he mentors a punk rocker through the process of becoming a conductor.  The episode won not only a BAFTA award but also the Golden Rose award and the Press Prize at the Montreux Festival.

Recent appearances have included concerts with the London Mozart Players, Bampton Classical Opera, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic orchestra, Ulster Orchestra, Guernsey Camerata, Guernsey Symphony Orchestra and London Concertino.

His recent CD of English music with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Raphael Wallfisch for Nimbus has just been awarded three stars in the 2008 Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music and the Holst Invocation was chosen as the best version available.