Biography Angela East is a most dynamic and controversial cellist who provides a captivating entertainment addressing her audience and playing several different instruments. As one promoter wrote, "The audience was spellbound; they went away wanting more..."
Angela showed her talent from an early age, winning the Arts Councils Suggia Award at the age of 14 and continuing her studies at the Royal Academy of Music with Derek Simpson and later with André Navarra and Christopher Bunting.
After several years of freelancing, Angela, in 1979, acquired a baroque cello and became co-principal cello with the English Baroque Soloists under Sir John Eliot Gardiner. Since then she has become a well-known continuo players and concerto soloist with a number of baroque orchestras such as the Brandenburg Consort and the Gabrieli Consort. She has performed at La Scala, Milan, the Sydney Opera House, the Carnegie Hall, the Palace of Versailles, the Presidential Palace in Portugal and ancient ruins of Pompeii and Athens. She performed in Handel's birthplace (Halle, East Germany) on the tercentenary of his birth and in 1989 undertook a world tour visiting the USA, Australia, Japan, Taiwan ad Hong Kong. She also played Principal Cello in the first performance on original instruments at Glyndebourne with Sir Simon Rattle. Her performances have included many radio broadcasts, recordings and television appearances, notably for the Open University. She has contributed articles to Early Music Today magazine and has been awarded and ARAM for he distinguished services to the music profession.
As one of the early pioneers of historical performance practice, her enthusiasm extends beyond the conventional parameters of early music in to the nineteenth century. To this end from 1990-2006 she founded and directed the Revolutionary Drawing Room, a multi-instrumental ensemble with the Revolutionary String Quartet as its core. She has now handed this group over to the leader, Adrian Butterfield.
She is member of Red Priest, the surrealist and theatrical baroque ensemble with Piers Adams (recorder). This group performs about 70 concerts annually, all over the world. It has founded its own recording company, Red Priest Recordings, which will make regular releases from Sep 2008. She is now training to be a teacher of the Alexander Technique, while continuing with Red Priest and will use the technique alongside her other experiences to make what contribution she can to the world of teaching musical instruments.
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