Founder + Artistic Director
As soloist and chamber musician, Irish pianist Mary Dullea performs internationally at venues including London’s Wigmore Hall, Casa da Musica (Porto), Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre, Phillips Collection Washington D.C., Symphony Space New York City, Palazzo Albrizzi Venice (Italy), Johannesburg Music Society and National Concert Hall Dublin. Festival appearances include City of London, Cheltenham, St. Magnus International Festival, Huddersfield, Aldeburgh, Sound Scotland as well as Lodi Festival (Italy), TRANSIT Festival (Leuven) and National Arts Festival (South Africa). Her frequent broadcasts include BBC Radio 3, Radio 4, RTHK, RTÉ Lyric FM, WNYC, Radio New Zealand and Sky Arts, Irish, French, Austrian and Italian television. Concerto appearances include RTÉ Concert Orchestra, RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra and KZN Philharmonic Orchestra.
Mary’s CD releases include on labels NMC, Delphian Records, Resonus Classics, Altarus, Col Legno, MNR, Naxos, Lorelt and Divine Art. Recent collaborations include premiere recordings of Philip Glass for Orange Mountain Music and projects in 2018 include a second instalment of French piano trios for Resonus Classics, a Gerald Barry portrait CD for Mode Records and the release of Marlacoo by Simon Mawhinney.
A sought-after interpreter of new music, Mary’s expansive repertoire covers the standard piano literature as well as an ever-increasing amount of 20th- and 21st- century compositions, many of which are dedicated to her. Her piano trio, Fidelio Trio, are passionate advocates for piano trio repertoire around the world. Constantly commissioning new works, composers that the Trio have worked closely with include Johannes Maria Staud, Gerald Barry, Donnacha Dennehy, Joe Cutler, Judith Weir, Kevin Volans and Charles Wuorinen, to name but a few.
Mary was the curator of Soundings (an annual UK/Austrian collaborative new music festival) at the Austrian Cultural Forum London from 2008 to 2016. She has served on the jury of ‘Schubert und die Musik der Moderne’ International Chamber Music Competition in Graz, Austria. In 2014 she founded ‘Chamber Music on Valentia’, an annual chamber music festival in Co. Kerry, Ireland, with the aim of bringing chamber music performances of international standing, innovative programming and outreach and engagement programmes to this unique place.
Mary’s own studies were at The Royal College of Music, London on the Edith Best Scholarship, Goldsmiths, University of London (MMus in Contemporary Music Studies)and her PhD in Performance is from Ulster University. Mary was on the piano faculty of Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama for 9 years. She previously held the position of Director of Performance at the University of Sheffield and since 2015 she has held this position at Royal Holloway, University of London.