Nigel Clayton – piano

Nigel Clayton studied with Stephen Savage and Angus Morrison at the Royal College of Music, London, where he won prizes in every category of piano performance and was awarded the College’s yearly prize for his Bachelor of Music degree. While there, particular interests in chamber music and accompaniment developed, and were further encouraged by international prizes at competitions in London and New York (Concert Artists Guild). His worldwide travel has since included major tours of India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan; the Middle East and America; Scandinavia; Europe; and performances in Japan, including a recital tour.

Nigel appears regularly on BBC Radio, at the Wigmore Hall and at the South Bank Centre, where he has given more than fifty recitals. He has played over one hundred solo recitals on board British luxury cruise liners SS Canberra, Oriana, Victoria and Arcadia.

He has performed concertos by Beethoven,Grieg, Liszt, Mozart Rachmaninov, Ravel, Schumann and Shostakovich, and was a soloist in Poulenc’s Two Piano Concerto at the Royal Albert Hall while still a junior student at the Royal College of Music.

As well as more than half a dozen long-standing regular partnerships, including a twenty-year association with violinist Beth Spendlove, which has produced more than one hundred recitals, Nigel has worked with numerous instrumentalists and ensembles of international repute. For twenty-one years he was Official Accompanist for the Tibor Varga International Violin Competition in Switzerland. He is a founder member of the Kingfisher Ensemble and the Edington Ensemble and has recorded many commercial CDs. He is principal teacher of piano at the North East of Scotland Music School, Aberdeen, and a professor on the keyboard faculty at the Royal College of Music, London.