The College Record 2022

Obituaries
firstly, there was his phenomenal sightreading ability which quickly made him an
indispensable musical presence in Queen’s as well as in the wider Oxford musical
community. Many performances at Holywell Music Room and other venues were
capped by his farewell performance, after Finals, of Haydn’s late C major Sonata in
which he captured all its grace, structural strength and wit. His Oxford career was
followed by two years of postgraduate study at the Royal College of Music where
he was awarded the Hopkinson Silver Medal.
Making his London debut in 1974, at Wigmore Hall, he went on to have a flourishing
career as a pianist in the UK and internationally, both as a soloist and as a highly
regarded duo pianist and accompanist to singers. He became particularly associated
with the four sonatas of Sir Michael Tippett which he studied with the composer,
recorded for the BBC, and performed frequently. He recorded for Hyperion the
complete song cycles of Tippett with the tenor Martyn Hill with whom he also
gave a memorable, semi-staged performance of Schubert’s Die Winterreise at the
Lyric Theatre Hammersmith. In the 1980s and 90s Andrew and I had a two-piano duo
which specialised in the performance of new music; we were sometimes joined by
the percussionists James Wood and Simon Limbrick for the performance of Bartók’s
great Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion, and this quartet gave a memorable tenconcert
Arts Council tour in 1985 which included a performance at Holywell Music
Room, so it felt as if we had come full circle. Later Andrew enjoyed performances
at the Proms and many of the principal UK festivals, giving the UK premiere of Sofia
Gubaidulina’s Piano Sonata at Bath in 1987.
In midlife Andrew discovered a special gift for teaching, and this took up more and
more of his energies, though he continued performing until Parkinson’s made it
impossible. Initially a highly successful and popular teacher at the Guildhall School
of Music and Drama, in 2000 he was appointed Head of Keyboard Studies at the
Royal College of Music in London. He pursued this energetically and with imagination,
but by temperament he was not really an administrator and he resigned his position
in 2005, staying on as Professor of Piano and teaching a large number of students,
many of whom have gone on to significant careers. Above all he took immense
pride in Thomas Kelly, whom he had nurtured since his schooldays at the Purcell
School and who went on to win every prize at the Royal College of Music, capping
this by becoming the first British finalist for 20 years in the Leeds International Piano
Competition.
Andrew had a unique and much cherished presence. A brilliant conversationalist, he
was witty, kind, and above all displayed a kind of intense musical humanity. Never
married, he was gifted in friendship and enjoyed his wide social circle even after
Parkinson’s robbed him of his independence.
Julian Jacobson (Music, 1968)
106 The Queen’s College | College Record 2022