about mark HERON

Mark Heron es un conductor escocés conocido por sus dinámicas performances a través de un inusualmente amplio rango de repertorio. Inusitadamente, su carrera sucesivamente combina trabajo con orquesta sinfónica, opera, música nueva y bandas de viento.

Es el director musical de la Nottingham Philharmonic, de la University of Manchester Symphony, y de las Liverpool Mozart Orchestras. Como miembro del cuerpo docente conductor del Royal Northern College of Music, Marks trabaja regularmente con el rango completo de las orquestas y conjuntos dela universidad, particularmente con la reconocida Orquesta de Vientos RNSM. Como director invitado ha trabajado con muchos conjuntos profesionales incluyendo la Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Meininger Hofkapelle, BBC Philharmonic, la Pori Sinfonietta (Finlandia), la St Petersburg Festival Orchestra, la Moscow Chamber Orchestra, la Scottish Chamber Orchestra y la Pärnu Philharmonic (Estonia).

Dedicado a trabajar con músicos jóvenes, además de sus trabajo en el RNCM, Mark ha trabajado con conjuntos desde la Royal Academy of Music, la Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama, los Tilburg & Maastricht Conservatories (Holanda), la National Youth Wind Orchestra de Israel, y la Liverpool Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. También aparece con regularidad como director invitado para bandas de viento en el Reino Unido, Israel, España, Holanda y en otros lados.

Mark tiene un entusiasta interés en la música contemporánea y ha brindado premieres mundiales de muchos trabajos importantes. Ha colaborado con compositores líderes como Magnus Lindberg, James McMillan, Mark Anthony Turnage, Giya Kancheli, Unsuk Chin, Kalevi Aho, Detlev Glanert y muchos otros. En 2006 dio la premiere europea de la opera de bandas de viento del compositor de EE UU Daron Hageb, Bandanna. Al día de hoy ha grabado 7 discos compactos con la Orquesta de Viento RNCM tocando un repertorio contemporáneo, incluyendo una grabación en vivo de la performance de la Orquesta en el World Association of Symphonic Bands y Ensembles Conference en Cincinnati, EE UU, 2009.

Mark estudió en el RSAMD y el RNCM. Siguiendo una exitosa carrera de música de cámara y trabajo independiente con muchas de las orquestas sinfónicas profesionales del Reino Unido, emprendió estudios de dirección en el RNCM y trabajó intensivamente en clases magistrales con Neeme & Paavo Järvi, Jorma Panula, y Sir Mark Elder. En 2005 Mark recibió el primer premio en el concurso de conducción de Neeme Järvi y en 2006 trabajó con Sir Colin Davis y la London Symphony Orchestra como uno de los tres jóvenes conductores seleccionados por la orquesta para su programa de mentores. 

Junto con sus compromisos como conductor de orquesta, Mark enseña dirección en el RNCM dentro de los programas Junior Fellowship, Masters, y External Studies de la universidad y también en la Manchester University, la Canford Summer School y como profesor visitante en la Royal Air Force.

critical reaction

"Those great contemporaries, Jean Sibelius and Carl Nielsen, are composers of contrasting musical ethic and aesthetic. Each pose difficult questions for any conductor and musician. Through attention to detail, and careful shaping of argument and structure, Heron and the orchestra came through the test with flying colours."

"Barber's 1st Symphony is a concert hall rarity, a piece written as one highly concentrated movement. It needs a conductor who can clarify its structure and relate the subtlety of its parts to the whole. Mark Heron certainly achieved this, particularly successful when handling the transitions between sections, as when the momentum of the opening spills over into the scherzo - which in turn tailed off into a plaintive oboe melody over rapt strings. He also imbued the ending, which comes full circle in a powerful coda, with a strong sense of inevitability."

"Sibelius's 7th symphony radiated total commitment and deep musical insight."

"Saturday’s performance [of Peter Grimes] had a powerful sense of emotional engagement with the morally ambivalent story and its cast of Suffolk townspeople. Mark Heron’s conducting was incisive and alive to the rich variety of Britten’s score. The famous ‘sea interludes’ were vividly atmospheric, ranging from the shimmering light effects of ‘Dawn’ to the elemental violence of ‘The Storm’"

"under Mark Heron's scrupulous guidance, the character [of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring] seemed balletic through and through. Negotiating an ever changing pulse with resolve, they went on to catch both the vitality of he seasonal dances and the solemnity of primitive sacrifice. Simply awesome."

"Mark Heron led a soulful and passionate performance of Brahms’s Fourth Symphony. The sound of the orchestra was astonishing and the pianissimo section in the slow movement was all the more beautiful for its contrast to the relentless vigour called for by Brahms"

"...the Nottingham Philharmonic under Mark Heron seems to reach greater heights of orchestral virtuosity."

"This was surely the best of the many orchestral collaborations seen at the prestigious La Mar de Músicas festival. The brilliance of Toumani Diabate of course made this possible, but it was as much due to the Orchestra Sinfonica de la Region de Murcia directed by Mark Heron who were outstanding in their sympathetic accompaniment."

"Heron is a conductor who clearly doesn’t want to act as a dictator towards the musicians, but rather as a catalyst between them and the composer's intentions"

"...the finale [of Tchaikovsky Symphony No.5] in particular was most impressive. Transitions between tempos were imaginative and convincing, there was some wonderful phrasing, and the optimistic climax well prepared and executed."

“In Saturday's performance under Mark Heron, Shostakovich's Seventh was vindicated as a masterpiece in its own right. A singular one for sure, but full of authentic expressive riches. The emotional ambivalence that was part of the composer loomed large in this performance, starting with the casual entry of the first movement's martial subject, and ending with the tonality of the work's final chords.”

"Despite his considerable experience, Mark Heron was conducting a Bruckner symphony for the first time. A composer like no other calls for a special approach and technique, and these were supplied in full measure. Above all it was the work's monumental features which were realised so effectively, as well as an enchantment recalling Schubert or Mahler. The many hushed openings to new paragraphs – "I need to take a deep breath," said Bruckner – were beautifully played. This music seemed to come not off the printed page but out of the surrounding ether."