Royal Academy of Music

History[edit]
Students take a lesson in fencing in 1944

The Academy was founded by Lord Burghersh in 1822 with the help and ideas of the French harpist
and composer Nicolas Bochsa.[2] The Academy was granted a Royal Charter by King George IV in
1830.[3] After many years of weak leadership the Academy faced closure in 1866 when its recently
appointed Principal (and former pupil) William Sterndale Bennett took on the chairmanship of the
Academy's Board of directors and established its finances and reputation on a new footing. [5]
The Academy's first building was in Tenterden Street, Hanover Square[6] and in 1911 the institution
moved to the current premises (which include the 450-seat Duke's Hall), [6] built at a cost of 51,000
on the site of an orphanage.[7] In 1976 the Academy acquired the houses situated on the north side
and built between them a new opera theatre donated by the philanthropist Sir Jack Lyons and
named after him and two new recital spaces, a recording studio, an electronic music studio, several
practice rooms and office space.[8]
The Academy again expanded its facilities in the late 1990s, with the addition of 1-5 York Gate,
designed by John Nash in 1822,[9] to house the new museum, a musical theatre studio and several
teaching and practice rooms. To link the main building and 1-5 York Gate a new underground
passage and the underground barrel-vaulted 150-seat David Josefowitz recital hall were built on the
courtyard between the mentioned structures.[10]

Campus and location[edit]

The facade of the Royal Academy of Music

The Academy's current facilities are situated on Marylebone Road in central London[11] adjacent
to Regent's Park.

Teaching[edit]
A violin lesson in 1944

The Royal Academy of Music offers training from infant level (Junior Academy), with the senior
Academy awarding the LRAM diploma, B.Mus. and higher degrees to Ph.D.[12] The former
degreeGRSM, equivalent to a university honours degree and taken by some students, was phased
out in the 1990s. All undergraduates now take the University of London degree of BMus.

Most Academy students are classical performers: strings, piano, vocal studies including opera,
brass, woodwind, conducting and choral conducting, composition, percussion, harp, organ,
accordion, guitar. There are also departments for musical theatre performance and jazz.
The Academy collaborates with other conservatoires worldwide, including participating in
the SOCRATES student and staff exchange programme. In 1991, the Academy introduced a fully
accredited degree in Performance Studies, and in September 1999, it became a full constituent
college of the University of London, in both cases becoming the first UK conservatoire to do so. [13]
The Academy has students from over 50 countries, following diverse programmes including
instrumental performance, conducting, composition, jazz, musical theatre and opera. The Academy
has an established relationship with King's College London, particularly the Department of Music,
whose students receive instrumental tuition at the Academy. In return, many students at the
Academy take a range of Humanities choices at King's, and its extended
academic musicological curriculum.
The Junior Academy, for pupils under the age of 18, takes place every Saturday.

Library and archives[edit]

The Academy's library contains over 160,000 items, including significant collections of early printed
and manuscript materials and audio facilities. The library also houses archives dedicated to Sir
Arthur Sullivan and Sir Henry Wood.[14] Among the Library's most valuable possessions are the
manuscripts of Purcell's The Fairy-Queen, Sullivan's The Mikado,Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a
Theme by Thomas Tallis and Serenade to Music, and the newly discovered Handel Gloria.[15] A grant
from the National Heritage Memorial Fundhas assisted in the purchase of the Robert
Spencer Collection a set of Early English Song and Lute music, as well as a fine collection
of lutes and guitars. The Academy's museum displays many of these items. The Orchestral Library
has approximately 4,500 sets of orchestral parts. Other collections include the libraries of Sir Henry
Wood and Otto Klemperer.[16]
Soon after violinist Yehudi Menuhin's death, the Royal Academy of Music acquired his personal
archive, which includes sheet music marked up for performance, correspondence, news articles and
photographs relating to Menuhin, autograph musical manuscripts, and several portraits of Paganini.
[17]

Harriet Cohen bequeathed a large collection of paintings, some photographs and her gold bracelet
to the Academy, with a request that the room in which the paintings were to be housed was named
the "Arnold Bax Room". Noted for her performances of Bach and modern English music, she was a
friend and advocate of Arnold Bax and also premired Vaughan Williams' Piano Concerto - a work
dedicated to her - in 1933. In 1886, Franz Liszt performed at the Academy to celebrate the creation
of the Franz Liszt Scholarship[18]and in 1843 Mendelssohn was made an honorary member of the
Academy.[19]

Student performances and festivals[edit]

Academy students perform regularly in the Academy's concert venues, and also nationally and
internationally under conductors such as the late Sir Colin Davis, Yan Pascal Tortelier, Christoph von
Dohnnyi, the late Sir Charles Mackerras and Trevor Pinnock. In summer 2012, John Adams
conducted an orchestra which combined students from the Academy and New York's Juilliard
School at the Proms and at New York's Lincoln Center. Conductors who have recently worked with
the orchestras include Semyon Bychkov,Daniel Barenboim, Sir Simon Rattle, Pierre-Laurent
Aimard and Christian Thielemann.[20][21][22][23] Famous people who have conducted the Academy's
orchestra also include Carl Maria Von Weber in 1826 and Richard Strauss in 1926.[24]
For many years, the Academy celebrated the work of a living composer with a festival in the
presence of the composer. Previous composer festivals at the Academy have been devoted to the
work of Witold Lutosawski, Michael Tippett, Krzysztof Penderecki, Olivier Messiaen, Hans Werner
Henze, Luciano Berio, Elliott Carter, as well as Academy graduates, Alfred Schnittke, Gyrgy Ligeti,
British and American film composers[who?], Franco Donatoni, Galina Ustvolskaya, Arvo Prt, Gyrgy
Kurtg and Mauricio Kagel.
In FebruaryMarch 2006, an Academy festival celebrated the violin virtuoso Niccol Paganini, who
first visited London 175 years earlier in 1831. The festival included a recital by Academy
professor Maxim Vengerov, who performed on Il Cannone Guarnerius, Paganini's favourite violin.
[25]

Academy instrumentalists and musical theatre students have also performed in a series of

concerts with the Academy alumnus Sir Elton John.[26]

The students and ensembles of the Royal Academy of Music perform in other venues around
London including Kings Place,[27] St Marylebone Parish Church and the South Bank Centre.

Museum and collections[edit]

Main article: Royal Academy of Music Museum
The Academy's public museum is situated in the York Gate building, which is connected to the
Academy's building via a basement link. The museum houses the Academy's collections, including a
major collection of Cremonese stringed instruments dated between 1650 and 1740, a selection of
historical English pianos from 1790 to 1850, from the famous Mobbs Collection, original manuscripts
by Purcell, Mendelssohn, Liszt, Brahms, Sullivan and Vaughan Williams, musical memorabilia and
other exhibits.[28]

People[edit]
Main article: List of Royal Academy of Music people

Alumni[edit]
Former students include John Barbirolli, Harrison Birtwistle, Dennis Brain, Edward
Gardner, Katherine Jenkins, Clifford Curzon, Lesley Garrett, Evelyn Glennie, Elton John, Annie
Lennox, Moura Lympany, Michael Nyman, Simon Rattle, Arthur Sullivan, Eva Turner, and Henry
Wood.[citation needed]

Academics and staff[edit]

The current principal of the Academy is Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, appointed in July 2008.[29] The
Patron is HM The Queen and the president is the Duchess of Gloucester.[30]Diana, Princess of
Wales was the president of the Academy from 1985 until 1996. [31]

Prizes and honorary awards[edit]

Main article: List of Royal Academy of Music people Honours
The Royal Academy of Music publishes every year a list of persons who have been selected to be
awarded one of the Royal Academys honorary awards. These awards are for alumni who have
distinguished themselves within the music profession (Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music,
FRAM), distinguished musicians who are not alumni (Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of
Music, Hon RAM), alumni who have made a significant contribution to the music profession
(Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, ARAM) and to people who are not alumni but have
offered important services to the institution (Honorary Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, Hon
ARAM). Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Music (Hon FRAM) is awarded by the
Governing Body of the Academy. As a full member of the University of London, the Academy can
nominate people to the University of London Honorary Doctor degree (Hon DMus).[32]
The Royal Academy of Music manages the Royal Academy of Music Bach Prize (sponsored by
the Kohn Foundation), a music award to musicians or scholars who have made an important
contribution to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach.[33]