Parkhouse Award

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Eligibility: Open to pno with str ens, from duo to pno quartet. Upper age limit 32. Requirements: Ens must show they have been performing together regularly during 2019 and 2020. Prizes: Winner awarded concerts in prestigious London venues, plus further concert opportunities. Entry fees: £50 Location: Central London. Dates: Spring 2021 (previously 2019). Closing date for applications: 1 Dec 2020. Frequency: Biennial.

Hamilton Cottage
Waterloo Road
Cranbrook
Kent
TN17 3JJ
United Kingdom

Ensembles of piano with strings (duo to piano quartet) who have been playing together during 2019 and 2020 are invited to enter the 2021 competition which takes place in Spring 2021 in London The deadline for entry is 1 December 2020.   Full details at www.parkhouseaward.com.

The brightest and best young chamber ensembles enter the international Parkhouse Award, such is its reputation.  Only one ensemble wins and the Award given is at least one concert in a prestigious London venue plus performances in important venues around the UK to bring them to the attention of promoters and further their careers.

The Parkhouse Award celebrated its 25^th anniversary in 2015 having been set up in 1990 in memory of the chamber musician and pianist, David Parkhouse.   He was a founder member of the Music Group of London with his wife, cellist Eileen Croxford Parkhouse, and violinist Hugh Bean and together they enjoyed an international career that lasted 37 years.  

Past winners of the Parkhouse Award include the Grieg Trio (Norway, winners 1991), Katharine Gowers/Charles Owen (UK, winners 1997), Fauré Quartett (Germany, winners 2003), Dimension (UK, winners 2005), Notos Quartet (Germany, winners 2011), Nils Mőnkemeyer/Nicholas Rimmer Duo (Germany, winners 2009), Fournier Trio (UK, winners 2013), Amatis Trio (Netherlands, winners 2015) and Trio Sōra (France, winners 2017).  2019 winners are the Lux Trio, based in Germany.   

DAVID PARKHOUSE, FRCM : 1930-1989

David Parkhouse was extraordinary in that he combined superb musicianship with business skills that would be envied by many classical music management organisations today.    His was a precocious talent, arriving at the Royal College of Music at the age of fourteen having won a major scholarship.    He studied with Herbert Fryer and Lance Dossor, and at the age of seventeen won the highest prize for piano playing, the Chappell Gold Medal.   His studies were interrupted by National Service, when he joined the R.A.F. and was stationed abroad, but was able to give many recitals in northern Germany, often broadcasting from Hamburg.   After demobilisation in 1951 and return to England, he won the Boise Foundation Award and the following year the Queen's Prize as a result of which he performed Franck's Symphonic Variations for Her Majesty the Queen (then H.R.H. Princess Elizabeth).    He was the youngest Professor to be appointed at the RCM and was elected a Fellow in 1972.   An early review in The Times reads, 'Already he has a splendidly reliable technique, an ear for refinements of tone, and a thoughtful and sincere musical mind'.    His future wife, Eileen Croxford, had also won the Boise and Queen's prizes and he created a busy schedule of duo performances for them, as he did with the violinist Hugh Bean, also a holder of the Boise Foundation Award.    Thus was born the Boise Trio, which later expanded to become the Music Group of London and which enjoyed a glittering international career playing to appreciative audiences and enthusiastic reviews the world over.    Their performance schedules read more like tests of endurance and would cause many an ensemble now to quail.   

This is where David Parkhouse the businessman came into his own.    Not for him the easy life where others provided the work and made the arrangements.    On the contrary, he organised tours of length and complexity to a vast number of overseas destinations.    One such, organised in collaboration with the British Council, for instance, started on 20 January 1972 and ended on 27 February with the ensemble having given 20 performances from Calcutta to Rome via Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Singapore, Kuching, Kota Kinabalu, Colombo, Madras, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Poona, Bombay, Delhi, Dehra Dun, Beirut and Nicosia.     Towards the later part of their career, in 1981, they were the first chamber group to be invited to tour in China giving concerts and masterclasses, making a total of four visits over the years. 

During 1984, they undertook a Far Eastern tour visiting nine different countries with an itinerary that included recitals, masterclasses and concerto performances.   The following year they visited the Middle East, Canada, the USA, South America, Scandinavia and Denmark continuing a pace of musical life they had enjoyed since the outset and which also included a very busy schedule in the UK with series at Wigmore  Hall and Queen Elizabeth Hall.

Add to this the fact that the three founder members of the Music Group of London were professors at the Royal College of Music with busy teaching commitments.    These, too, received special attention as David believed passionately that young musicians should experience the rewards of chamber music-making.    A full afternoon of workshops would be followed by a trio performance, and the group similarly inspired the students at the Universities of Cambridge, Reading and Durham where they were also ensemble-in-residence.   Recordings for numerous labels, live and recorded broadcasts for television and radio complete this sketch of the Music Group of London, an exemplary group driven by the energy and passion of its founder member David Parkhouse.