Harpsichordist Masumi Yamamoto is based in the UK and regularly performs across the UK and abroad as a soloist and continuo player. She has appeared with orchestras including St. James’s Baroque, Yorkshire Baroque Soloists and the International Baroque Players, and has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in the UK and ABC Classic FM in Australia. She was a prize winner at the prestigious International Harpsichord Competition in Bruges in 2007 and became the first Japanese harpsichordist to reach the finals in 21 years. She was also a semi-finalist in the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition in Leipzig (2006), a runner-up in the Broadwood Harpsichord Competition in London (2007), and the winner at this year's Fenton House Keyboard Ensemble Competition (2012) with ensemble Akenside Players.

 

Masumi graduated with a University Medal from the Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University in Brisbane Australia where she studied piano with Leah Horwitz and harpsichord with Huguette Brassine. In the UK, she studied at the Royal Academy of Music, then at Trinity College of Music as a pupil of harpsichordist James Johnstone and was later "The English Concert" Junior Fellow with ensemble Melopoetica. Masumi is currently a PhD candidate at the University of York.

 

Masumi's performance highlights include recording for a BBC Radio 3 programme “Discovering Music”with St. James’s Baroque and the BBC singers under James O’Donnell, a recital of two-harpsichord music in Bristol, London and York, and Bach’s multiple-keyboard concertos in Brisbane Australia. She has also appeared in concerts with such distinguished musicians as Dame Emma Kirkby, Gillian Keith and Robin Blaze, and a solo recital at the Handel House Museum received a four-star rating in The Independent: "her tempi follow the pulse of the heart, and her ornamentation is as natural as breathing".

 

Now also a keen teacher, Masumi has given lessons and Masterclasses at Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music in Singapore and Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University in Australia, and is Teacher of Harpsichord at St. Paul's Girls' School.