The Joyce and Michael Kennedy Award for the Singing of Strauss / Tue 9 Jun

Sophie Akka
Soprano Sophie Akka is a Master’s student at the RNCM, supported by the Dame Eva Turner Award, having previously studied at The Queen’s College, Oxford. Operatic roles include Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Nicolette (L’amour des trois oranges), Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), and Violetta (Brindisi for China State TV). She has won Clonter’s Betty Bannerman Award for French Song and the Sir David Maddison Opera Prize. Recent performances include Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater in Florence and Bach’s Mass in B minor. An RNCM Songster, she has appeared at Buxton Opera Festival.

Merel-Magali Cox
Dutch mezzo-soprano Merel-Magali Cox is a first-year Master’s student at the RNCM, studying with Mary Plazas. A recipient of multiple awards, including the Dame Eva Turner Award and Help Musicians support, her operatic roles include Cherubino (Le nozze di Figaro), Linette (L’amour des trois oranges), Idamante (Idomeneo), and the Woodpecker (The Cunning Little Vixen). An RNCM Songster, she has won prizes in the Song Cycle Competition and the Williams-Howard Prize. Concert highlights include major works by Bach, Handel, Beethoven, and Elgar. This summer, she joins Buxton International Festival as a Young Artist.

Gabriel Jones
Tenor Gabriel Jones studies at the RNCM with Mark Wildman. His roles include the Narrator (Owen Wingrave) and Mosquito (The Cunning Little Vixen), alongside scenes by Mozart, Piccinni, and Rossini. In concert, he has performed in Bach’s Mass in B minor and Stainer’s The Crucifixion, with Mozart’s Requiem and Beethoven’s Mass in C forthcoming. He previously read French and History at King’s College, Cambridge, where he sang in the chapel choir and performed widely. His studies are supported by the David Williams Memorial Award.

Bonnie Staude
Australian soprano Bonnie Staude is completing a Master of Music at the RNCM with Elizabeth Ritchie, supported by the Anstey-Harriott Awards, the Ian Potter Cultural Trust, and the Mary Thomson Scholarship. A graduate of WAAPA, where she received the 2024 Medal, her roles include Zerlina (Don Giovanni), Susanna (The Marriage of Figaro), Gretel (Hänsel und Gretel), and Annina (La traviata). She has also performed scenes as Maria (Maria Stuarda) and Donna Elvira. At the RNCM, she won the Frederic Cox Award for Singing and the Song Cycle Competition, and joins Buxton International Festival this summer.

Jemima Gray
South African mezzo-soprano Jemima Gray studies at the RNCM with Mary Plazas. Roles include the Forester’s Wife (The Cunning Little Vixen), Clarisse (L’amour des trois oranges), Kate Julian (Owen Wingrave), and the Abbess (Suor Angelica). She has also performed with Garsington Opera and the Berlin Opera Academy. A Buxton Opera Young Artist and Frederic Cox finalist, she made her Wigmore Hall debut in May 2025, premiering works by Roxanna Panufnik. Future engagements include Opera Holland Park and a production of Cavalleria rusticana. She is supported by the Annie Ridyard Scholarship.

Alex Riddell
Baritone Alex Riddell is in the final year of his Master’s at the RNCM, studying with Mark Wildman. His recent work includes the title role in Britten’s Owen Wingrave and participation as a Buxton Festival Young Artist. He has performed in a range of productions within and beyond the RNCM. Future engagements include Bach’s Mass in C and Cavalleria rusticana with the Lake District Music Festival.

David Jones
David Jones was born on the Wirral and completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Wales, Bangor, specialising in performance and studying piano with Jana Frenklova. He graduated from the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, with a Postgraduate Diploma in Piano Accompaniment and the degree of Master of Music in Performance. After a year as Junior Fellow in Repetiteur Studies at the RNCM, David lectured for three years at University College, Salford. He joined the School of Keyboard Studies at the RNCM as a staff pianist in 1996 and was appointed Accompaniment Co-ordinator, now Head of Accompaniment, in September 2001. He held the post of Deputy Head (Performance) for Junior RNCM between 1998 and 2023 and was for four years Chorus Master of the RNCM Chamber Choir. David is pianist for the Hallé Choir, and founder and Musical Director of Altèri, the Manchester-based chamber choir. He completed his PhD at the University of Manchester in 2011, researching the music of Jeffrey Lewis, and has so far released three discs of Lewis’s piano, chamber and vocal works, on ASC, Campion Cameo – ‘Gramophone’ described it as ‘…a disc not to be missed by anyone who cares about communicative 20th-century music’ – and Metier/Divine Art, with RNCM alumni Caroline MacPhie (soprano) and Zheng Yu Wu (violin). 

Jonathan Fisher
Jonathan Fisher is an accomplished and sought after collaborative pianist having had notable performances at Leeds Lieder, Oxford Lieder Festival, Ryedale Festival, Harrogate Festival, and The Richard Strauss Society, along with many other recitals for music societies across the United Kingdom (UK). He has performed in many prestigious venues throughout the UK including The Purcell Room, The Wigmore Hall, The Bridgewater Hall, and Philharmonic Hall Liverpool. Jonathan has built his career around collaboration, having worked with internationally recognised singers such as Roderick Williams, Benjamin Appl, Sir John Tomlinson, Rachel Nichols, Kathryn Rudge, Anna Stéphany, Lynne Dawson, Linda Richardson, Paul Nilon, and Louise Winter. He has performed and toured with the young and vibrant saxophonist Jess Gillam, collaborated with Phillipe Tondre (principle oboe of the Philadelphia orchestra), Józef Bazsinka (tuba, Budapest Festival Orchestra), and soloists of the Halle Orchestra, amongst others. Recent recordings include a recital disc of songs by Julian Dawes, and The Soldier’s Legacy for Retrospect Opera. In addition to his active performance schedule, Jonathan is committed to working with the next generation of musicians. He works as a Staff Pianist and Coach for the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), where he is the co-founder and Artistic Director of the RNCM Songsters. Jonathan graduated with first class honours from The University of Huddersfield and has a Master of Music in Performance from the Royal Northern College of Music. He studied with David Jones and Benjamin Frith, and in addition has taken masterclasses and private tuition from Malcom Martineau, Julius Drake, and Roger Vignoles. 

Robin Humphreys
Robin Humphreys is a graduate of the University of Birmingham and a holder of the prestigious Diploma in Professional Performance from the Royal Northern College of Music, where he studied piano accompaniment with David Lloyd. Appearing in concert for over forty-five years, he enjoys a successful career as an accompanist and répétiteur (praised as “world-class” by Louise Flind for “Opera Today”), the breadth of his repertoire being reflected in television and radio broadcasts ranging from BBC Radio 3 to Emmerdale!  

In addition to being a Professor of Vocal Coaching within the School of Vocal Studies and Opera, he has appeared with the Manchester Camerata, has been Musical Director for Feelgood Theatre Productions and, from 1990-2000, Opera & Concert Productions (Worldwide) Ltd with whom he toured throughout the Gulf, the Indian sub-continent and the Far East. Robin has a particularly close association with Clonter Opera Theatre in Cheshire, where he regularly works as Assistant Musical Director and Accompanist. For thirty-five years he was an accompanist member of the British & International Federation of Festivals. 

Susan Bullock CBE
Susan Bullock’s unique position as one of the world’s most sought-after dramatic sopranos was recognised with the award of a CBE in 2014.