Biography

Gillian caught the eye of international percussionists when she attended the Juilliard Summer Percussion Seminar, a festival for advanced high school percussionists.

She was one of only 16 pupils selected worldwide to attend the seminar. A graduate of St Mary’s Music School, Gillian’s consuming passion is the marimba.

As a young musician her achievements include winning the Director’s Recital prize at St Mary’s and winning joint first place in the inaugural percussion class at the 2004 Edinburgh Music Festival.

Gillian says that she chose to study at the Frost School of Music because it “has the broad percussion base I want to study and isn’t based purely on orchestral, but also has jazz, ethnic/world music and solo performance.”

How the Award Helped

The Dewar Arts Award is funding Gillian for four years at the Frost School of Music, Miami. She was put on the Dean’s list in Spring 2006.

Since the Award

Due to an unfortunate road accident, Gillian was forced to withdraw after three years’ study at Frost School of Music. We’re happy to note that this did not prevent Gillian from pursuing her career ambitions. She is now pursuing a solo career and in 2009 in Ireland premiered a work for solo marimba written for her by a Scottish composer.